Mt. Sequoyah Tech Camp

The TEK Center partnered with Mt. Sequoyah Tech Camp to teach robotics to their campers. Campers ranged from ages 5 to 12 years old so we had to pull all the tools in our tool box to make sure that everyone had something that was challenging for them. It helped that the campers were broken down into three different groups based on age.

For our youngest group, we helped them work through Kubo Kits. Kubo Kits have a small robot that reads the tiles the campers layout and then follows the commands. The campers start by just making the robot go forwards, left, or right and then move on to using loops for repetitive tiles. When campers got the hang of how to use all the tiles, we challenged them to make mazes for their robots or plan out a day for their robots using the locations on their mats. Later in the week we did a programming race were students had to give program instructions to the teacher robots to complete an obstacle course. The campers found out that you have to be very precise with instructions for them to work.

For the middle age campers in our second and third groups, we worked on Lego EV3 Kits. This way students could work through the instructions to build the base of the robot to learn how certain pieces interact and build confidence before creating arms and additions of their own creation. Campers also learned how to program their robots to work through a maze, but they found battle bots much more interesting. For battle bots, the first robot to be pushed out of the taped ring would lose.

The last group was with the oldest campers, so we worked through Pitsco Education Kits. These kits take the campers through building a metal robot similar the the base robots of FIRST Tech Challenge. Using a simple chassis and a preprogrammed electronics, the campers again had the option of working through a maze or battle bots. Whichever robot left the ring first lost, very similar to the game previously played by a younger age group, however many interesting strategies formed as the campers were able to control the robots during the battles with controllers.

A HUGE thank you to FTC Team 8373 Diva Force for helping to mentor campers and run the robotics classes and to Mt. Sequoyah for allowing us to teach the classes during their Tech Camp.