Edgewood Students Compete And Win In Lego® Robotics Competition
Posted
David Slone-dslone@timesuniononline.com
They were novices when they began building the Lego® robots, but now two groups of Edgewood Middle School students are state award winners.
The EMS Orange Team won first in teamwork at the Lego® Robotics state competition. The Black Team won second in innovative solution for their research. At state, if a team doesn't win the whole competition, team members aren't told exactly what place they finished. But out of 48 teams at state, both Edgewood teams finished in the top 25 percent. State competition took place Dec. 12 at IPFW in Fort Wayne.
Regionals were held in Elkhart. The Orange Team took first in teamwork, and the Black Team took first in innovative robot design and first in quality research. The Black Team was third out of 17 teams, with Orange placing fifth. The top six teams at regionals moved on to state.
Fifty-one students in Ben Barkey's science class built Lego® robotics starting at the beginning of the school year. Classes were broken up into teams.
Black Team member Anna Bearss said the teams had to do two things. First, they had to build a robot and program it for two missions. They also had to do a project on a transportation-related theme.
Christian Guzman, Orange Team, said they had to come up with an innovative solution for a problem, which was based on the transportation theme.
Orange member Alexi Demopoulos said they worked one hour each class period and 1-1/2 hours after school almost every day on the robotics. Fridays, they worked until about 6 p.m.
When they began building the robotics, Black Team member Dean Katris said, they started off with a main idea of what they wanted the robot to look like. They then built the robot around that idea.
Barkey was very good at keeping all the eight teams organized and on track every week, Bearss said. Guzman said it was all based on the scientific method.
One of the hardest parts of the process, said Demopoulos, was programming the robot to do what the team wanted it to do. Sometimes they'd program it to do one thing, but it would do something else entirely. The robots would have two or three motors, and it was difficult to get the motors to work together, Demopoulos said.
"The problem we had was consistency," said Bearss.
Autumn Scott, Orange team, said there was four teams in each class period. Everyone was crowding around, using others' cords and even sometimes breaking robots. Getting along was sometimes difficult.
Everyone working on the robotics had their strengths, Ben Alspaugh, Black Team, said. Alspaugh said he and Bryce Fritzel were good computer programmers. Katris and Will Petro were good at building, while Bearss and Chandler Stevens did most of the project. However, Alspaugh said, everyone helped on each segment of the competition.
Stevens said their presentation was given in a play form. Bearss said theirs was more of a skit.
Scott said Grant Carlson, Demopoulos and she generally worked on their robot. Abbi Baum, Olivia Fisher and Guzman worked more on the project end of the competition.
Everything used for the competition had to be from Lego®, Stevens said.
"If it wasn't made by Lego®, we couldn't use it," said Katris.
"Our robot was designed around a catapult, which was our main program. It shot balls at access markers," said Petro.
The robots fulfilled missions on a mission board, said Bearss. Missions ranged from knocking things down and following a line to moving things around.
Each mission had a point value. The maximum amount of points a team could get was 400, so the mission of the robot was to get as many points as possible. If a robot made an error, a team could lose points.
"There was a lot of trial and error. We went through a lot of different models and programs," said Alspaugh.
Kyle Wettschurack, Orange team, said, "Besides Ben and Bryce, I don't think any of us knew how to program a robot. We really had to work to get it to work."
To decide which two teams would move on to regionals, Barkey's classes had a little competition. Whoever won in class moved on to regionals. After the decision was made, the two teams didn't have any more time in class to work on their robots. They had to do it on their own time. Demopoulos said the teams tried to get together as much as possible, but they all had busy schedules.
At regionals, Stevens said, they couldn't watch other teams' presentations. They could only watch them during trials. The top three teams got to demonstrate their robots for the whole crowd.
Demopoulos said all the other teams were very smart. The other teams had parental involvement, said Stevens, and were extracurricular. Edgewood teams were there because it started as a class project.
Forty-eight other teams competed at state, said Scott.
"I think the teams were a lot better and had a lot more interesting designs" than regionals, said Wettschurack.
He said they did not get a lot of time at state to practice with their robot. They had only 30 minutes in the morning to practice and make any changes. He said they tried to change their robot to get more points, but they couldn't get access to a missions board.
"Overall, I think it was a great learning experience and other kids need to experience what we did," said Baum of the robotics competition. She said the students really learned to work as a team.
Demopoulos said the competition only allowed one award per team at state. They want to spread the awards around. Overall score, he said, was based on how well a team's robot did, the robot design and presentation, and how well a team worked together.
"We had to work really hard on this because it was for a grade. It wasn't just extracurricular," said Petro.
Barkey had the students write papers on their robots, accomplishments, core values and an assessment of the whole year, the students said.Barkey said he was very proud of all the work all students in his classes did on their robots. "They put a lot of time in it, a lot of dedication," he said. What made it fun was when the students were excited to do the hard work.
This was the third year Barkey did the competition as part of his class. This year also was the second year that Edgewood worked with engineers from Zimmer. Zimmer provided mentors to bounce ideas off the students. Students also had the opportunity to tour Zimmer and see its robotics department.
"They're really flexible over there. The employees they sent over here were really great," said Barkey.
EMS Principal JoElla Smyth also was very proud of the students and the whole experience.
"It's a great example of project-based learning where kids integrate math and science," Smyth said. Students also learn about teamwork, thinking outside the box and many other components.
The neat thing this year was that both teams sent to regionals also made it to state. Next year, Smyth predicted, Edgewood could win state.
She said Edgewood was lucky to partner with Zimmer. It's a good example of how schools and the community can partner together. The theme for next year's competition is orthopedics. By staying partnered with Zimmer, an Edgewood team could move on to nationals.
Smyth also praised the way Barkey doesn't give his students the answers, but lets them be creative. He asks the students what they think they should do to solve an issue with their robot.
"I think we'll see the benefit of something like this in these kids' lives for years to come," Smyth said of the robotics competition.
