YES Tested and Approved: FIRST Lego League

While you’re working on incorporating elements from our Inventor Inspiration Room, get your little genius involved in some seriously smart play! YES Spaces Design fully embraces the power of play, and we believe in engaging children in fun and challenging ways to learn. Because we are such big believers in the power of play, we love programs like FIRST Lego League (FLL),  a rapidly growing international program that harnesses the power of play to teach children important creative thinking skills.

FLL is a subdivision of For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology (FIRST), a program that motivates young students to pursue careers in technology. FIRST has four levels: Jr. FIRST LEGO League, FIRST LEGO League, FIRST Tech Challenge and FIRST Robotics Competition. Combined, these programs provide opportunities for students ranging in age from 6-year-olds to high school.

FIRST programs are team “brain sports” that appeal to many students, even if they aren’t interested in robotics. These students learn and practice many skills such as researching, public speaking, visual presentations, skit writing, computer programming, building, teamwork and more! FLL helps kids develop problem-solving skills, form strategies, and think creatively.

Every year there is a new challenge theme. This past year it was Food Factor, or in other words, keeping food safe. Teams build and program autonomous robots out of Legos, but this is only one part of the judging criteria.

The students also present a “project” or invention.  There were so many exciting inventions presented! Don’t let the LEGO title fool you, this project portion of the competition doesn’t have anything to do with Legos.  Most of the projects were presented in a fun skit format to share their research with not only the judges, but with their communities as well.

One of our young local teams discovered that one ice pack is not enough to keep the food in your child’s lunch box properly chilled.  In a presentation to our local community, the team shared that food should be surrounded by a cold pack to keep food at the safe temperature of 40 degrees Fahrenheit or less. This group of mostly 4^th graders found products online (like the freezable lunch box we noted in a previous blog), but they felt they were fairly expensive and didn’t always suit their needs. So they decided to make adaptable ice bags that could fit to individual lunch boxes. They put one part rubbing alcohol and 2 parts water in ziplock bags and sealed the bags together with duct tape. The alcohol keeps the bags from freezing solid so they can be wrapped around the food. These are fun to make and personalize:

Next year the challenge is Senior Solutions and the teams are tasked with helping seniors to be independent, engaged and connected.

If you don’t have an FLL Team at your child’s school, look into getting one! It is beneficial in so many ways. Check out the FIRST website for more information. Want to see the robots in action? Here is a link to a great video on FIRST.

Thank you, Bolton Primary School FLL Team, the Fire-Breathing Micro Ducks: Wiley W, James N, Kyle B, Ethan S, Sydney R and Nikki R. and congratulations on your trophy, but most importantly, on a job well done!

Tagged as: Creative play, FIRST Lego League, Inventor, Legos, Power of Play