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Lego robots take stage in VacavilleNov 20, 2011 (The Reporter - McClatchy-Tribune Information Services via COMTEX) -- For a few seconds, the Vacaville Unified School District's Lego robot -- coursing over a 4-by-8-foot plywood table matted with roughened paper -- seemed to be inching along with a first-place finish on its computer-processor brain, its young student programmers cheering on their plastic, wheeled creation. Then, just as quickly, for no apparent reason, the robot turned left and motored into a black-painted, 2-by-4 wooden wall, not so much with a thud but a mechanical whimper. Olivia Salvador, 12, a seventh-grader at Vaca Pena Middle School in Vacaville, placed her hands against her head in shock and surprise, her mouth somewhat agog, the frustration on her face clear from across the cafeteria at Will C. Wood High School. There, on Saturday, while competing against 11 other Northern California teams, she and four teammates participated in the 4th Annual FIRST Lego League robotics qualifying tournament, one of 28 competitions for elementary and middle school students across the region that would determine winners for a district tournament in February. FIRST, an acronym for For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology, is a New Hampshire-based charity that seeks to pique young people's interest and participation in science and technology and inspire students to be science and technology leaders. Saturday's tourney was themed "Food Factor" for the Lego pieces of corn, fish, pizza, etc., that the robots were programmed to dump, gather and return, if all went as planned, to a home "base." Volunteer referees Dan Bucsko and Bruce Dorworth monitored the action, while scorekeeper Barry Rico, VUSD digital educational specialist, projected the scores onto a screen. By 2:10 p.m., Salvador's team, with all but one student enrolled in VUSD schools, was in fifth place with 165 points and about half of the "robo games" segment completed. "It's kind of frustrating," she said of the performance by Glados, her team's bot, a mini Mars rover-like gadget that was a neat mix of connected parts, palm-size motors and a series of sensors for light, color and rotation. "We've been working on this for three months," she added, sighing, her body slumping a little with the disappointment. Still, there was little time to dwell on this temporary letdown. She and her teammates -- Patrick Fletcher, 9, a fourth-grader at Callison Elementary; Daniel Gonzalez, 10, a fifth-grader at Browns Valley Elementary; Donovan Dougherty, 10, a fifth-grader at Orchard Elementary; and Manny Crump, 13, an eighth-grader at Bethany Lutheran School -- had also competed in two other categories, design and presentation, and were going to be evaluated in another, "core values," a test of their collaboration skills. At midday, Jo Anne Bucsko, administrator of special programs for VUSD and tournament director, huddled with several design judges in the Marshall Road high school's library, tallying points for each team. Including a Vacaville Christian Schools team, they came from as far north as Willits, in Mendocino County, and west to Fairfax, in Marin County. Judge Phillip Jenschke, a robotics teacher at Vacaville High, said he evaluated the bots on design, sensors and subsystems, the logic of the bots' articulated elements. ___ (c)2011 The Reporter (Vacaville, Calif.) Visit The Reporter (Vacaville, Calif.) at www.thereporter.com Distributed by MCT Information Services |