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how's the 3d pen working? my kids' cousins got one, but quickly bailed on it because it appeared to be all about drawing what are essentially frames in 2d and then connecting them to make things 3d.
haven't even used it yet
yeah- both my kids are still building their lego sets.haven't even used it yet
she's still wading through the Minecraft LEGO sets and books
Yeah, that is a shame. There is significant cost with some of these programs. The FTC program is significantly more costly than the younger FLL teams. A team really needs to work at fundraising, finding corporate sponsors, and developing a financial plan. This is more true the further up you go. All of this is rolled into part of a great learning experience. Over the years, we have sold concessions, held bake sales, sponsored contests etc. as a means of fundraising for our team.
The first robotics program is pretty amazing for high school kids. We recently hired an engineer who was heavily involved growing up and now coaches a local high school first team. He's easily the best engineer we've hired out of college and way ahead of where I was coming out of college as an engineer. I can't recommend the program enough if your kids are into this sort of thing. It teaches them team work, problem solving, finances, deadlines, everything an engineer would typically deal with. It's awesome.
+1 on Scratch. Kids can make their own video games pretty easily.the moops said:
What amount does it take per year to field an FLL or FTC team?Galileo said:
Myself and two other dad's currently coach a team that consists of nine 7th and 8th graders. We did start our team. The FIRST website provides guides and resources for how to make that happen. We were also fortunate to have some others in our neighborhood that had blazed the trail before us that were able to offer some insight and guidance along the way (in fact, outreach of this sort is highly encouraged and promoted within the program). Some of the older kids helped mentor the younger ones by organizing workshops to help the newbies start to learn the technology and programming concepts...a workshop that our team continued the following year for rookie teams that followed us. The robotics program in the community has now grown to 9 FLL teams and 4 FTC teams. We have created a non-profit robotics organization to help coordinate and continue to grow the program.
Do you have any links to some low cost experiements I can perform for my kids kindergarten class? Each week they have a different set of parents come in for "VIP" day...we get about an hour and can choose any topic. Typically, they're fun, interactive and the kids walk away with "something" (something they made, candy, prize, etc). I'd really like to make it STEM related if possible.phowler13 said:
yeah- our elementary school has it as part of after-school. it was started by a couple of parents, but then got more "serious" and they brought in outside help. that's the point when it went from a fun affordable thing for Jr to do to something that was going to put too big a dent in my budget. if cost was no issue, I'd love to have him do it.
typically not so bad.how steep is the learning curve
for dads
UPDATE (and opportunity to brag) So, it is now two years later. That first year we got our asses handed to us. Last year we managed to make it into the finals of one of the FTC qualifying tournaments (qualify for the state tourney), but fell a little short. Today, I am happy and proud to say that our team survived the field of 28 robots and was part of the winning alliance at the Kent State Qualifying tournament. We have advanced to the Ohio State Tournament!! On the way to winning the robot game, we took down 6 awards: 1st place Design award, 2nd place in the Control, Motivate, Innovate, Promote, and Inspire awards. Those probably don't mean much to any of you unless you are familiar with FIRST FTC Robotics, but it was a big day! I am so proud of my two boys and their teammates.
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