News : VS students play well, learn well with Legos while advancing to State FLL event

The Retro Recyclers demonstrate the hammer they built for their First Lego League competition.

Members of the Fluffy Trash Destroyers demonstrate the attachment that captures and drags items.

“Play Well.”

The Danish translation of that phrase is “leg godt.” The first two letters of those two Danish words have kept Vinton-Shellsburg 5th through 8th grade students busy working, learning and playing well – and together – for much of this school year.

Now, those students are preparing for the State First Lego League competition, as they combine their computer skills, teamwork and their ability to build with those little plastic interlocking bricks made by the company started in 1932 in the village of Billund, Denmark.

It’s been a few years since a VS Lego League team went to State; Ruby Boddicker’s 5th graders advanced to State in 2010.

First Lego League is a joint effort between Dean Kamen, the founder of FIRST (For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology) and Lego Group owner Kjeld Kirk Kristiansen, the grandson of the original Lego inventor.

The V-S students are among more than 233,000 participants competing on 29,000 teams in more than 1,350 event in 80 countries.

What FLL is:

The students in each First Lego League team begin each year with the same items: They build with pieces from the Lego Mindstorms Education Set, which is a collection of Lego blocks, wheels, gears and other tools. They also can keep parts from previous years to add to their options. The “brain” of the robot is a computerized device known as the Lego Mindstorm, which comes in a couple of versions, NXT Brick and EV3.

Each team also receives a practice course that is identical to the one they will use in competition. The course includes a set of objectives – things the robot can be programmed and designed to do.

This year, the theme of FLL is “Trash Trek.” The missions replicate things that may happen in the environmental/solid waste management arena: Unloading a truck, picking up plastic bags, moving personnel to employment stations, moving animals to safe zones.

There are few rules about the course.

“They can't use Bluetooth or any sort of remote systems,” explains Elementary ELP teacher Alissa Mann. “Everything must be programmed using the computer software.”

But other than that she says, the robot design is “completely open to their imagination.”

FLL teams represent grades 5-8; Mrs. Mann’s students competed against older, more experienced teams – and they won.

While the 5th graders and middle school students competed in different qualifying events, they both will attend the same State competition at the ISU campus in Ames. The teams will travel to Ames on Saturday, Jan. 16, and compete the next day.

Teamwork, friendship and core values

Team members at both Shellsburg and VS Middle School, where first-year ELP Teacher Jeff Mangold is the FLL advisor, recently spent some time demonstrating their robots, discussing their presentations and sharing the lessons they have learned.

In just three weeks, the FLL season will be over; the students already say they will miss it.

At Shellsburg, the members of the three teams – The Fire Breathing Rubber Duckies, the Fluffy Trash Destroyers and the Water Bottle Bombers – shared their team chants, recited the FLL Core Values and talked about the challenges they have faced and the friendships they have formed.

Teammates have become best friends; students laugh about things that went wrong – like a peanut butter packet that exploded in one member’s pocket during the taping of a video.

The members of the Rubber Duckies did not earn a trip to state, but they did win a Core Values award for having the most team spirit. Rubber Duckies members think perhaps the energy with which they recited their team chant was a factor – many others at the regional competition witnessed their enthusiasm.

The VS Middle School teams also did very well at their Regional contest.

The Clean Up Crew got two awards: High Points for Robot Mission and Project Award and earned a chance to compete in the State Competition. Retro Recyclers were the Champs and are also going to State.

The Retro Recyclers brought the hammer down – literally – at their competition. While many teams used levers, lifts, and other attachments to move or push parts of the course, the RR team members came up with an idea to put a large hammer on their machine for a couple of missions. It worked – and impressed the other team members.

Parents praised Mangold for his energy and creativity. He wore purple and blue headbands to support the Disco Ninjas team and during the weeks of preparation, brought in a mentor, engineer (and current VSMS Lego League mom) Susan Colsch, who has her own Lego League experience, to help advise the students.

VSMS team members included:

Clean Up Crew: Isaac Allsup, Keira Ott, Taylor Shipley, Lucy Howes-Vonstein, Josie Sagan, Elias Colsch, Javan Andrews, Ethan Rollinger, Maddison Atkinson, Emily Trinkle

Disco Ninjas: Elsa Page, Morgan Lang, Graham Henkle, Brynn Patterson, Tess Lillibridge, Jozee White, Natalie Armstrong, Leah Hendrickson

Retro Recyclers: Megan Hendrickson, Samantha Walton, Max Vasquez, Caroline Erickson, Kale Schulte, Kinzzy Miracle, Alex Guenther, Zena Aragon, Ella Hainey

Recycling Raiders: Charlie Dudley, Rylee Scheel, Carly Lang, Xander Dawson-Fink, Hunter Hazen, Taylor Lint, Raileigh Schulte, Lauren Hendryx and Lillie Lamont.

The Shellsburg 5th grade teams included:

Fluffy Trash Destroyers: Ian Allsup, Joseph Koopman, Jaxson Rule, Aspen Ahrenholz, Jade Coots, & Autumn McGowan

Fire Breathing Rubber Duckies: Annabelle Newton, Lizzie Noe, Ashlie Meyer, Brian Jeffries, & Josh Wiley

Water Bottle Bombers:Darby Glynn, Natalie Dean, Cami Dawson-Fink, Brylee Bruce, Alyssa Griffith, & Mason Coder.

Core Values: We are a team

During their interview, the Shellsburg FLL students recited the FLL Core Values:

• We are a team.
• We do the work to find solutions with guidance from our coaches and mentors.
• We know our coaches and mentors don't have all the answers; we learn together.
• We honor the spirit of friendly competition.
• What we discover is more important than what we win.
• We share our experiences with others.
• We display Gracious Professionalism® and Coopertition® in everything we do.
• We have FUN!

Presentations and projects

While the robots get much of the attention at the FLL contests, another important part of the event and team scoring is the presentations. Each team chooses a particular topic related to the theme of the competition, and makes a presentation to a panel of judges. The presentations are graded on how well the students research and how clearly they present their topic.

The judge’s comments for the presentation by the Retro Recyclers credits them for “knowing their stuff,” and declared them to be “exemplary” – the highest level – in sharing their information with multiple individuals or groups who may benefits, and for being “very engaging and exceptionally imaginative and clear and well organized.”

The teams also take their educational efforts a step further and begin projects to help make other students as well as the community more aware of environmental issues. They toured the landfill, created QR that their peers can scan to learn more about environmental issues. And the Retro Recyclers are leading an electronics recycling effort at VSMS.

Teachers thank sponsors

Several Iowa businesses have helped sponsor both the state FLL and VS teams.

“When I first started I applied for all sorts of grants to buy extra pieces and brains,” says Mrs. Mann. “Rockwell Collins, John Deere, the Governor's STEM Grants, and Theisen’s have all awarded us grants to gather supplies. This year, we just had John Deere but in years past we have had other sponsors. Companies are really supportive of new coaches and schools.”

The State Competition at Iowa State University in Ames on January 17 is a free event and open to the public.

First Lego League teams are part of the Expanded Learning Program classes, although there was some space for a few students not in the ELP to be part of the Lego League.

See photos from the Regional competition HERE.

See photos from recent practices HERE.