For the second half of 2017 Bricks 4 Kidz Boroondara and Whitehorse has been working with a group of extremely talented young builders to enter the FIRST Lego League competition.
FIRST Lego league has been operating for 19 years and challenges students in four areas to become the future of STEM (Science Technology Engineering and Maths). The theme this year is HydroDynamics – how we transport, use and dispose of water. The four components of the competition are:
- Robot Game – students have 2.5 minutes for their LEGO Robot to autonomously solve as many challenges related to the theme as possible on a 2.4×1.2m field. The field is the same for all 350,000 competing students across the world and was released in August 2017, giving students approximately 3 months to design and program their robot.
- Robot Design – the students talk to the judges about how they designed their robot and completed the programming task. It’s a chance to show the judges just how good their robot really is and all the amazing parts that make it function on the field.
- Research Project – Based on the theme students complete a real life research project and share it with the community. The students need to talk to relevant industry experts, understand a problem and create a real solution to share with the world. Many projects go on to earn patents and become actual products. The website ev3lessons.com was born in the research project in 2014/15.
- Core Values – FIRST (For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology) is built on the core values of having fun, learning, teamwork and sharing experiences. Students talk to the judges about how they demonstrate these values.
Back in November the Bricks 4 Kidz team working with Presbyterian Ladies College won the Melbourne Regional championship and are currently competing in the National Championships at Macquarie University in Sydney.
If you’re interested in joining our team for 2018 don’t forget to come along to one of our holiday workshops