The team worked on a "rough draft" of their DI-Bot. Some holes were drilled and a mouth cut out of an old garbage can and an inclined plane roughly put into place with a pulley and some rope. Some rough testing showed the basic concept worked but still needs some refinement.
The team then moved on to some instant challenges. The first challenge involved building a vehicle to travel down an inclined plane as slowly as possible. The team came up with a paper plate that slid on some packing peanut glides. They then used some air power (they are full of hot air) to regulate the speed of the vehicle. The maximum number of points for the slow sliding was 60 (2 points per second, maximum of 30 seconds) and they maxed this out. The one area they could have improved on was using more of their materials and making a "prettier" vehicle.
The second IC was one Karlie came up with. It involved splitting into two teams and independently making up a story. The 2 groups then had to come together and, on the spot, put them together. Karlie and Megan were going to a candy store when they see a tornado. Jared and Luke were shopping for Christmas party supplies. They all ended up in some unknown place when they see another tornado. It brings them to their home in the future. They finally get home in the present and decided to have their Christmas party together.
They team then decided that Christopher and I should attempt the same challenge together. Christopher was taking a micro economic test and I was jack hammering in the street and hit soda. My jack hammering disturbs Christopher who comes out in the street, I give him a drink of the soda to give him the energy to complete his test.
As always check out the photo album to get a taste of the action.
Have a great Christmas,
Mr. H.
Wednesday, December 16, 2009
Sunday, December 13, 2009
Meeting #9 - 12/13/09
During this meeting the team dug deep into the design of their DI bot. A trip to Fleet Farm provided the inspiration the team needed. It's fun going to these types of stores with DI teams. I make them ask someone for help and inevitably the clerk will look right past the kids and to the adults (Christopher and I in this case). I always tell the clerk they have to talk to the kids. Anyway the kind Fleet Farm clerk pointed the team to the parts of the store that have pulley, rope, springs, garbage cans and all of that kind of good stuff :-)
The team spent some time playing around with pulleys, ropes, garbage cans, etc. and managed to rough out a concept for how they are going to have their garbage can turn into into a recycling spitting robot garbage can. We bought one pulley and quickly returned to KI so the idea could be sketched out, see the photo album for a rough idea of what they are going to attempt to build. If anyone has an old (but not too disgusting) garbage can they wouldn't mind having the team destroy please send it along to Wednesday's meeting. We have some left over rope from the egg event that we'll use and the team is also in the market for some door hinges. The other major piece the team is looking for are a motor/drum arrangement (the team has talked about using an old fan for this purpose) but they could pretty much use any old machine that has a motor that rotates a drum. Wednesday they will start experimenting with some of these parts and pieces and see what they can put togehter.
The last part of the meeting the team attempted a walk through of their performance. The general story continues to come together and make pretty good sense for this early stage. The team will need to come up with an innovative way to accomplish one of their scene changes.
The team is making some great progress on their main challenge. Only two more meetings left in 2009!
The team spent some time playing around with pulleys, ropes, garbage cans, etc. and managed to rough out a concept for how they are going to have their garbage can turn into into a recycling spitting robot garbage can. We bought one pulley and quickly returned to KI so the idea could be sketched out, see the photo album for a rough idea of what they are going to attempt to build. If anyone has an old (but not too disgusting) garbage can they wouldn't mind having the team destroy please send it along to Wednesday's meeting. We have some left over rope from the egg event that we'll use and the team is also in the market for some door hinges. The other major piece the team is looking for are a motor/drum arrangement (the team has talked about using an old fan for this purpose) but they could pretty much use any old machine that has a motor that rotates a drum. Wednesday they will start experimenting with some of these parts and pieces and see what they can put togehter.
The last part of the meeting the team attempted a walk through of their performance. The general story continues to come together and make pretty good sense for this early stage. The team will need to come up with an innovative way to accomplish one of their scene changes.
The team is making some great progress on their main challenge. Only two more meetings left in 2009!
Friday, December 11, 2009
Meeting #8 - 12/10/09
We had a good meeting. On the main challenge front the team has the story pretty well roughed out, a lot of details left to fill in but I have confidence they'll have no problem completing the story. The technical part of the challenge involves building the "DI-Bot" they have some good concepts here but it's time for them to start attempting to turn some of them into reality. For our next meeting we will probably take a shopping trip to Menards or Home Depot to scope out some possible supplies. The team is looking for springs, pulleys, rope, an inclined plane, and a garbage can or something that can be used as a garbage can. The rough ideas look good we'll see if they can actually put something together now.
For an IC they did a building challenge where they had to make a structure that was as cantilevered as possible. There were a couple of tricks written into the challenge including height not making any difference for the scoring and speed being an element. They nearly maxed out the points for the amount of cantilever on the structure.
They also did a performance based IC where they had to invent a new animal that could be a pet. I don't recall the animals name but it had a trunk type of thing that could either clean up or create a mess in your home.
There are some pictures of all of this action in the photo album.
For an IC they did a building challenge where they had to make a structure that was as cantilevered as possible. There were a couple of tricks written into the challenge including height not making any difference for the scoring and speed being an element. They nearly maxed out the points for the amount of cantilever on the structure.
They also did a performance based IC where they had to invent a new animal that could be a pet. I don't recall the animals name but it had a trunk type of thing that could either clean up or create a mess in your home.
There are some pictures of all of this action in the photo album.
Sunday, December 6, 2009
Meeting #7 - 12/6/09
Tonight the team worked on their contribution to the T-Shirt design, continued to brainstorm ideas for their main challenge, and did an Instant Challenge.
For the T-Shirt design each team is making a contribution by coming up with something to put in a small circle, all of these circles will then be combined to make the overall T-Shirt design.
For the main challenge the idea involving the garbage can that turns into a robot and rejects recyclables thrown into it continues to take shape. An outline of the overall story has been made and preliminary character assignments have been made.
For the Instant Challenge the team did a challenge called "The Bridge to Nowhere". They basically had to build a bridge sticking straight out not connecting to anything. They received points for how far the bridge reached, how well they work together as a team, and how creatively they used the materials they were given. The team did good on the challenge, maxing out the points for distance and scoring well on teamwork. After the challenge they redid the challenge to see if they could go further, this time without one of the key materials they made use of the first time (mailing labels). It was interesting to see how different the second bridge was as compared to the first. There are a few new pictures in the photo album showing the action.
For the T-Shirt design each team is making a contribution by coming up with something to put in a small circle, all of these circles will then be combined to make the overall T-Shirt design.
For the main challenge the idea involving the garbage can that turns into a robot and rejects recyclables thrown into it continues to take shape. An outline of the overall story has been made and preliminary character assignments have been made.
For the Instant Challenge the team did a challenge called "The Bridge to Nowhere". They basically had to build a bridge sticking straight out not connecting to anything. They received points for how far the bridge reached, how well they work together as a team, and how creatively they used the materials they were given. The team did good on the challenge, maxing out the points for distance and scoring well on teamwork. After the challenge they redid the challenge to see if they could go further, this time without one of the key materials they made use of the first time (mailing labels). It was interesting to see how different the second bridge was as compared to the first. There are a few new pictures in the photo album showing the action.
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