Introduction to Coaching a FIRST Lego League Challenge Team
Written by Paul Barbone, with edits to relate it to the Glastonbury program
About FIRST Lego League: FIRST LEGO League Challenge (FLLC) is attractive to many parents seeking a way to leverage a child's interests in LEGO building toward some desired end, be it technology education, socialization, or something else. This article is meant to try to help you decide whether FLLC is right for you and your child.
FIRST is an acronym meaning “For Inspiration in Science and Technology.” The FIRST organization sponsors robotics competitions at many levels; FLLC is the level intended for children in grades 4-8. That “FIRST” comes before “LEGO” in FLL indicates an important fact to keep in mind when considering FLLC for your child: The emphasis is clearly on science, technology, teamwork and robotics; the LEGO in FLLC merely provides an age-appropriate and accessible means toward that end.
FIRST Lego League Challenge Season: FLLC sponsors international competitions in league format with one season per year. Each year in late summer, the yearly “Challenge” is announced, which sets the theme and rules of the competition for that year. FLLC teams will work for the next few months to prepare for a tournament. Tournaments in Connecticut are held in mid-November. A team can officially enter only one regional (qualifying) tournament.
FLLC Competition: The annual Challenge includes a theme, which is a societal problem that might be (at least partially) addressed through technology. The competitions are designed around that theme and therefore change annually. Nevertheless, they always contain three main elements: FIRST “core values,” a research project focused on the annual theme, and a robot game. To be eligible for prizes in the competitions, an FLLC team must excel in each of these three categories.
FIRST's core values include “Gracious Professionalism® and Coopertition®” and are Discovery, Impact, Innovation, Inclusion, Teamwork and Fun. Teams are scored in this area based on how well team members communicate and work together. Judges interview the team to score the students on these values.
The FLLC research project requires the team to (1) define a real-world problem, (2) learn about that problem, (3) invent and propose a potential solution to that problem, and (4) reach out to potential stakeholders. Some past themes have been food safety, assisted living for the elderly, and natural disasters. The team gives a presentation, often a skit, to judges who use a rubric to score each team.
The FLLC robot game is the best known part of FLLC competition. To compete in the game, a team must build a LEGO robot (we use SPIKE Prime LEGO robots), program the robot to move autonomously (i.e., by itself) around a playing field, and to perform any of a series of tasks at different locations on the field. A team scores a specified number of points for each task successfully performed by its robot. These games are viewed and cheered on by everyone at the competition; the scoring of the core values and the project are done in a private judging room.
Is FLLC right for your child? FLLC is great for children who are interested in science and technology in general, and particularly those who enjoy competition. FLLC is a competitive league, after all, and children participating should expect to contribute to all parts of that competition, including research for the project challenge and programming for the robot challenge. FLLC is not a LEGO building club. (The author notes that he encountered many children who were disappointed by how little LEGO building there was, and others who were frustrated by other team members who kept dismantling and rebuilding previously settled designs.)
Should you coach your child's team? Here's what you need to run your own FLLC team:
Written by Paul Barbone, with edits to relate it to the Glastonbury program
About FIRST Lego League: FIRST LEGO League Challenge (FLLC) is attractive to many parents seeking a way to leverage a child's interests in LEGO building toward some desired end, be it technology education, socialization, or something else. This article is meant to try to help you decide whether FLLC is right for you and your child.
FIRST is an acronym meaning “For Inspiration in Science and Technology.” The FIRST organization sponsors robotics competitions at many levels; FLLC is the level intended for children in grades 4-8. That “FIRST” comes before “LEGO” in FLL indicates an important fact to keep in mind when considering FLLC for your child: The emphasis is clearly on science, technology, teamwork and robotics; the LEGO in FLLC merely provides an age-appropriate and accessible means toward that end.
FIRST Lego League Challenge Season: FLLC sponsors international competitions in league format with one season per year. Each year in late summer, the yearly “Challenge” is announced, which sets the theme and rules of the competition for that year. FLLC teams will work for the next few months to prepare for a tournament. Tournaments in Connecticut are held in mid-November. A team can officially enter only one regional (qualifying) tournament.
FLLC Competition: The annual Challenge includes a theme, which is a societal problem that might be (at least partially) addressed through technology. The competitions are designed around that theme and therefore change annually. Nevertheless, they always contain three main elements: FIRST “core values,” a research project focused on the annual theme, and a robot game. To be eligible for prizes in the competitions, an FLLC team must excel in each of these three categories.
FIRST's core values include “Gracious Professionalism® and Coopertition®” and are Discovery, Impact, Innovation, Inclusion, Teamwork and Fun. Teams are scored in this area based on how well team members communicate and work together. Judges interview the team to score the students on these values.
The FLLC research project requires the team to (1) define a real-world problem, (2) learn about that problem, (3) invent and propose a potential solution to that problem, and (4) reach out to potential stakeholders. Some past themes have been food safety, assisted living for the elderly, and natural disasters. The team gives a presentation, often a skit, to judges who use a rubric to score each team.
The FLLC robot game is the best known part of FLLC competition. To compete in the game, a team must build a LEGO robot (we use SPIKE Prime LEGO robots), program the robot to move autonomously (i.e., by itself) around a playing field, and to perform any of a series of tasks at different locations on the field. A team scores a specified number of points for each task successfully performed by its robot. These games are viewed and cheered on by everyone at the competition; the scoring of the core values and the project are done in a private judging room.
Is FLLC right for your child? FLLC is great for children who are interested in science and technology in general, and particularly those who enjoy competition. FLLC is a competitive league, after all, and children participating should expect to contribute to all parts of that competition, including research for the project challenge and programming for the robot challenge. FLLC is not a LEGO building club. (The author notes that he encountered many children who were disappointed by how little LEGO building there was, and others who were frustrated by other team members who kept dismantling and rebuilding previously settled designs.)
Should you coach your child's team? Here's what you need to run your own FLLC team:
- Time: For the duration of the season, the team should meet at least once per week for several hours at a time. Multiple shorter meetings per week are often more productive for the kids than fewer longer meetings. In Glastonbury, teams typically meet at one coach's home.
- Space: The 4' x 8' plywood playing field is roughly ping-pong table size. We provide the table and two sawhorses for supports. Setting up and taking down the field can take 15 minutes each, so you'll save a half hour per meeting if the field can stay set up throughout the week.
- Money: The minimum cost to run an FLLC team is at least $450 per year, assuming you already have all the equipment you need (robot, LEGO pieces to build attachments, table and supports). Costs include $225 team registration fee; $75 field kit, plus up to $150 in tournament registration fees. The cost of the robot materials adds another $600. This estimate assumes that your team will have access to devices (school iPads) for programming and project research. At this time, Glastonbury Public Schools and Glastonbury Friends of Robotics supports our teams so that parents only have to pay $35 per child. We also provide a custom T-shirt. Fundraising by parents and coaches is appreciated!
- Enthusiasm and Patience: The children will be motivated by your enthusiasm for the research project and the robot challenge. The FLLC project challenges are deliberately open-ended, and so the children will need your help and guidance to focus and define their projects. They will also need your help when frustrated by a program that's not working like they think it should.
- No particular programming or robotics knowledge: Your job as coach is not to tell the children what to do, nor even to show them how, but rather to show them how to learn to do what they wish to do. Direct your children to any of a number of excellent tutorials on programming LEGO robots. A few minutes poking around the web will identify videos on how to make a robot go straight, on how to write a program to make a robot follow a line, on how translate distance on the board to rotations of the wheels, etc. Helping the children help themselves frees them from the limits of your knowledge.
- Meeting Schedule: Glastonbury coaches work with the parents on the team to set the meeting schedule. Our kids are so committed with activities and most coaches work. Usually teams meet one day on the weekend for a long meeting, or two shorter meetings, maybe in the evening after work.
- Team Membership: Because students are meeting in coach homes and each coach has a different skill level in managing students, the team size and composition is up to the coaches. They need to be at least 6 students to justify the level of funding per team and FIRST limits the team size to 10 students.
- Requirements: Coaches must pass two background checks. There is a quick one online with FIRST that you must both pass in order to start the team. Glastonbury Public Schools requires the two main coaches to pass a background check which involves fingerprinting at the BOE office on Hebron Avenue. Two adults must be present at each meeting. Parents can help, as long as one background checked coach is present.
- Expectations: All teams are expected to make it to one regional competition, held on a Saturday in November (there are two dates from which to choose). It's okay if you only have a couple robot missions or the project isn't well-developed. It's a learning experience, especially for first time coaches. Coaches need to read the manual provided by FIRST and are expected to have two adults present at every meeting. You are expected to model and teach the kids the core values of the program and make sure the students behave according to these values at meetings.