4th Grade Idea Lab-- CARGO CONNECT Challenge

 

Cargo Connect is the name of the FIRST LEGO League's theme for 2021-- aiming to teach children about how cargo is transported from the manufacturer, sorted correctly and efficiently, and delivered to the correct destination.  

The students are challenged to design a robot and complete a robot game that will include missions on a special table.  Get the robot to complete a mission.  The missions fit into 4 categories: safety, efficiency, access, and connections.  They are also challenged to complete an Innovation Project where they will create a solution to a problem in the transportation industry and present that idea to an audience.

We began with the preseason building challenges and built simple machines and attachments to get to know our pieces and what could be accomplished without a hub or motor.  Students built one-way curtains, carabiners, gears, gear boxes, rack gears, aligners, scissors, auto-retracting levers, and a simple machine called gravity. 

Then we moved into this season's challenge sessions.  Each session includes a project spark-- that encourages students to think about safety, efficiency, access, and connections.  Students are expected to apply the FLL Core Values during sessions: Discovery, Innovation, Impact, Inclusion, Teamwork, and Fun.  These are also highlighted in our Engineering Notebooks that we use throughout the session. 

Students are creating the builds that go with the Robot Game Missions during our sessions as well as testing out their EV3 Robots and attachments.

Now that the mission build models are ready, it will be exciting to see the students attempting to conquer the Robot Game Missions.  We had a sweet victory with one of our groups and the Accident Avoidance Mission.  Click HERE to see a video clip of one of the 4th grade groups.

In the next few sessions, we will begin the Innovation project.  We have been using the STEAM room for these sessions. 

It is an exciting time in Idea Lab!

3rd Grade- First Lego League Update

The lab has exploded with LEGOS again!  

We are having a blast with our First Lego League Challenge-- CARGO CONNECT.  Teams have created some prototypes of types of transportation as well as experimentation with their robot and programming.  

This week, teams have the task of creating a cargo sorter that detects color with a sensor and sorts cargo according to their color.  

The program needed a color sensor as well as programming directions to correctly sort the cargo by color. 

I asked two students to demonstrate how the cargo sorter worked.  

Click HERE to view!

 Teams are also getting their robots to change directions, emit light, and make a sound with parts and programming. 

We will continue to keep you updated periodically with our CARGO CONNECT challenge in Idea Lab!  Stay tuned!

2nd Grade- First Lego League Update

 The lab has exploded with LEGOS!  

We are having a blast with our First Lego League Challenge-- CARGO CONNECT.  Teams have created some prototypes of types of transportation as well as experimentation with their robot and programming.  

Later this week, teams have the task of creating a cargo sorter that detects color with a sensor and sorts cargo according to their color.  Teams are also getting their robots to change directions, emit light, and make a sound with parts and programming. 

To get us acquainted with our LEGOS and how to use Google Classroom, students created a LEGO sculpture that represents something they like to do in their spare time.  Can you identify your child's sculpture based on their hobbies and interests?

We will continue to keep you updated periodically with our CARGO CONNECT challenge in Idea Lab!  Stay tuned!

Selfie Sculptures

Through an activity, Selfie Sculpture, students were able to recognize social and emotional characteristics and needs within themselves and represent them in a sculpture. These sculptures include color-coded shapes that represent learning preferences, stress reactions, intensities, strengths, and struggles. 

 Here is an example of what students were asked to reflect upon:

Social-emotional learning is very important for gifted students. Many gifted children need targeted assistance with peer relationships, perfectionism, asynchronous development, and situational stressors.

We also tried getting to know each other a little better with an activity called, I Connect. This is an activity where we told a story about something that has happened in our life, and if another student has a connection, they stand up and say, "I connect with that because..." and then the student continues a story about their life until another student stands up and says "I connect with that because..." We did this activity with the staff during our professional development this summer, and I decided to try it with our Idea Lab classes. We had fun hearing the stories and finding connections with our classmates.

Welcome to Idea Lab for the 2021-2022 School year!

We've had a great start in Idea Lab this school year. We started off with a creative activity called Thingamabob. Students created an item that represented a scenario or experience during their summer break, and the class had to guess whether their Thingamabob was from a real or imagined experience during the summer. The catch was that they could only use 5 items, and they had to create their item in 20 minutes or less. It was like watching an episode of Kids' Master Chef. Fun!

Some examples of Second Grade Thingamabobs

Some examples of Third Grade Thingamabobs

Some examples of Fourth Grade Thingamabobs

           

During some of our future sessions, we will begin our First Lego League Explore unit, Cargo Connect! The teams will explore the future of transportation. From the shipment of packages in rural and urban areas, to disaster relief delivery and high-tech air transit, teams will re-imagine faster, reliable, inclusive, and sustainable transportation innovations. Click here to view a video that explains our Cargo Connect Challenge!  

Farewell 4th Grade! Archaeology Highlights

Our final quarter of 4th grade Idea Lab has come to an end, and I am so sad to say Good-Bye to our 4th Grade Spoede Turtles.  However, I am glad that we were able to end our time together studying archaeology.  It was really a blast.  Take a look at some of our highlights!  

A mini-dig where 3 different cultures were discovered!  

Egyptian, Ancient Chinese, and Aztec artifacts were pulled out of the dig and discovered!

 

Students gained a deeper understanding of culture and cultural universals after taking a closer look at several cultures as well as categorizing and classifying artifacts into the cultural universal categories.

Students also had an opportunity to create artifacts that belong to a culture in a certain time period in history for another class to dig up and discover.




Students also learned about the ancient written language of Egyptian hieroglyphics and how scientists and archaeologists are able to decipher and decode these with careful analysis and collaboration.

Students learned the basics of stratigraphy as well as absolute and relative dating. Then it was time for the bigger outdoor dig! The students were ready to discover and analyze their findings to reveal the hidden culture.  
This year's 4th-grade group was always curious, excited, and ready for a challenge. I will miss them dearly!

"Education is not preparation for life; education is life itself."

—John Dewey

"My favorite animal is the turtle. The reason is that in order for the turtle to move, it has to stick its neck out. There are going to be times in your life when you’re going to have to stick your neck out. There will be challenges, and instead of hiding in a shell, you have to go out and meet them."

—Ruth Westheimer

Once a turtle...always a turtle.  We will miss you 4th Graders!  Now go out there and stick your neck out!