Today Sandy Garner from Otago University very kindly invited me into her world of robotics. I spent the day playing with Lego Mindstorms NXT and EV3 robots. I experimented with different types of programming. My knowledge of programming lies in simple activities I have completed on code.org, Hopscotch and Scratch. Sandy had, however, put together some easy-to-follow books which I worked my way through. Before I knew it, it was all starting to make a lot more sense to me.
Wow...what a buzz when the robot completed the actions I intended for it....getting it to follow a black line, getting it to stop at a black line, drawing a shape, making noises. My personal triumph was in getting a robot to track and maneouvre a ball.
Wow...what a buzz when the robot completed the actions I intended for it....getting it to follow a black line, getting it to stop at a black line, drawing a shape, making noises. My personal triumph was in getting a robot to track and maneouvre a ball.
The learning was awesome...problem solving, perseverance, logic, heaps of maths. So authentic and instant feedback about whether you were on the right track or not. Fabulous! How could I not be engaged and how could kids not be engaged?
Sandy is passionate about robotics and so generous with her time and her knowledge. She has been working hard to get robotics into more schools so if you're in Dunedin and want to get robotics happening, get in contact with Sandy or myself.
Sandy organises the annual Robocup event in Dunedin as well as running after school classes for eager kids. I was fortunate to visit on a day when the kids' group was running. It was impressive. One student was building an electric guitar. A couple of other students were planning their Robocup entries with what looked like fairly complicated code to me! Another was building a crane which would lift and move objects. They were all so engrossed and in control of their learning.
I have had very little experience with robotics and I am interested in finding ways to make it more accessible to schools and less intimidating for teachers.
Sandy is passionate about robotics and so generous with her time and her knowledge. She has been working hard to get robotics into more schools so if you're in Dunedin and want to get robotics happening, get in contact with Sandy or myself.
Sandy organises the annual Robocup event in Dunedin as well as running after school classes for eager kids. I was fortunate to visit on a day when the kids' group was running. It was impressive. One student was building an electric guitar. A couple of other students were planning their Robocup entries with what looked like fairly complicated code to me! Another was building a crane which would lift and move objects. They were all so engrossed and in control of their learning.
I have had very little experience with robotics and I am interested in finding ways to make it more accessible to schools and less intimidating for teachers.