Legos have become more than building blocks for teams of Round Rock ISD students who take competition and engineering seriously through Lego robotics.
Teams from Gattis, Laurel Mountain and Spicewood, Caraway elementary schools as well as Canyon Vista, Grisham and Hernandez middle schools competed in the “World Class” themed Central Texas First Lego League Competition last month. During the competition, teams completed three tasks, which consisted of robots designed to certain specifications, a research project to solve a problem and teamwork.
Laurel Mountain and Spicewood elementary schools, Canyon Vista and Grisham Middle School teams and Brickmasters, a team consisting of students from Caraway and Laurel Mountain elementary schools and Canyon Vista Middle school, have advanced to the invitation only Central Texas Regional Championship March 7, 2015.
“Beyond having lots of fun, the students are engaged and enthusiastic about designing and building their very own robot and creating the programs that control it,” said Julie Haney, Spicewood instructional technology specialist. “This hands-on, inquiry-based learning approach allows students to be creators, which motivates them to continue exploring engineering and technology.”
One of the six teams from Laurel Mountain won the first place championship award and first place for robot performance. The all-girls Lego robotics team, Learning EVLution from Grisham, won the third place overall champions award. The Knowledge Knights from Canyon Vista won first place championship award. Brickmasters won the second place championship award.
According to First Lego League, the Overall Champion award “recognizes a team that embodies the First Lego League experience by fully embracing our core values while achieving excellence in innovation in both the Robot Game and Project.”
“In our experience with the First Lego League for the last four years, the top award usually goes to middle school kids,” said Sarma Vanguri, Laurel Mountain Lego Robotics parent. “Our teams have won numerous other awards at First Lego League events, but this is the first time we won the first place overall champion award. It is probably one of the very few, if not the first time an elementary school team won this award.”
“We did not win anything, but I as so proud of our team,” said Daniel Brillhart, the team sponsor for Gattis. “After we went to our first judging, I was just grinning. They did beautifully and no one can take that away.”
