Robo Magic
Today we took the legos to Inyokern School, to Emilee's 5th grade class. We've been talking about this for months, and now that the school year is almost over, we finally had the opportunity. Robert, Danny, and Joe came to help out. We got there as lunch recess was ending and the kids were all excited to see us. I heard one kid say something like "There's Emilee's mom... she's got legos!" They ran out to the car to help carry stuff in, surrounding Robert and I, swarming exuberantly around as we walked out. We got everything into the class, and the teacher settled down the crowd of 36 students so I could get started.
They were a good audience and I told them that in my classroom at the college, when I was speaking it was time for the students to be quiet and listen, and that there would be plenty of time for them to talk soon. Since they had all been up at CC a few weeks ago, we just reviewed a couple of things. I love pulling answers out of students, going with what they bring out, exploring the concepts they bring up in a little more depth. "What is a robot?" I asked. That led to some discussion about artificial intelligence, about how sensors work, and about what robots can do.
Next came the task. I described the scene, a gruesome crash with bodies and cars and Ridgecrest Regional Hospital. I asked them what kind of robot they thought we would need in a scene like this, and of course, someone said "an ambulance". When I mentioned that they should build something to bring back a victim to the hospital so they could be saved, someone pointed out the ones without heads and the ones without legs. Oh well. Too late to save some of them!
The kids spent an hour of high impact, high energy, high level creativity, experimenting and exploring, trying things out, troubleshooting problems, and pushing the boundaries of what they know. The teacher told me that this was the most engaged she had seen one of the girls all year. The principal came in to observe and we talked about what it would take to do this as an afterschool club next year. Even the teacher from next door stopped by to see what all of the excitement was about. Tomorrow we will build some, program some, and run the robots. You can tell people what this is all about all day long... but it isn't until they see it in action that they get what it is all about. Another amazing day in RoboLand :)
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