{"id":644,"date":"2013-05-30T15:47:15","date_gmt":"2013-05-30T05:47:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/legoeng.local\/?p=644"},"modified":"2017-12-21T17:49:42","modified_gmt":"2017-12-21T06:49:42","slug":"its-not-rocket-science-keep-it-simple","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/legoeng.local\/its-not-rocket-science-keep-it-simple\/","title":{"rendered":"It&#8217;s not rocket science: Keep it simple!"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The word &#8216;robotics&#8217; can be a little intimidating to a teacher new to the field. I constantly encounter teachers who have been thrust unsuspectingly into the role of the &#8216;robotics teacher&#8217; simply because they were in the staff room at the time the Principal was looking for a volunteer. \u00a0They hear the words &#8216;robotics&#8217; and &#8216;programming&#8217; and are immediately filled with dread. But while it is possible to use robotics to create amazingly complex creations, we often overlook the fantastic array of simple, and educationally effective activities we can do.<\/p>\n<p>The following is a range of activities you can run in class using just a single Block in NXT-G, the &#8216;Move&#8217; Block<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><a href=\"http:\/\/legoeng.local\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/05\/How_fast1.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\" wp-image-655 aligncenter\" src=\"http:\/\/legoeng.local\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/05\/How_fast1-300x106.jpg\" alt=\"How_fast1\" width=\"400\" height=\"142\" srcset=\"http:\/\/legoeng.local\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/05\/How_fast1-300x106.jpg 300w, http:\/\/legoeng.local\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/05\/How_fast1-600x212.jpg 600w, http:\/\/legoeng.local\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/05\/How_fast1.jpg 637w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 400px) 100vw, 400px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>With this block we can get the robot to move based on the following parameters<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Direction<\/li>\n<li>Steering<\/li>\n<li>Power<\/li>\n<li>Duration<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h2>Activity 1: How far to the shop?<\/h2>\n<p>You&#8217;re at home, you need to get to the shops. The shops are 100cm away. How many rotations do you need to get there?<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><a href=\"http:\/\/legoeng.local\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/05\/How-far-to-the-shops.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-651 aligncenter\" src=\"http:\/\/legoeng.local\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/05\/How-far-to-the-shops-300x225.jpg\" alt=\"How far to the shops\" width=\"300\" height=\"225\" srcset=\"http:\/\/legoeng.local\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/05\/How-far-to-the-shops-300x225.jpg 300w, http:\/\/legoeng.local\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/05\/How-far-to-the-shops-600x450.jpg 600w, http:\/\/legoeng.local\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/05\/How-far-to-the-shops.jpg 960w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<h2>Activity 2: How far does your robot travel?<\/h2>\n<p>How far does the robot travel with 1 rotation? How about 2 rotations? \u00a0Is there a relationship between how many rotations the wheels turn and how far the robot travels?<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h2>Activity 3: \u00a0How fast does your robot travel?<\/h2>\n<p>How far does your robot travel in 2 seconds? What about 4 seconds? \u00a0What about 6.3 seconds? Could you plot all this data as a graph? \u00a0Reading from the graph, can you predict how many seconds are necessary to travel 72cm? What is the average velocity? \u00a0Does the distance change if you are on carpet\/concrete\/wood\/grass?<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-653 aligncenter\" src=\"http:\/\/legoeng.local\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/05\/Screenshot_053013_033933_PM-300x230.jpg\" alt=\"Screenshot_053013_033933_PM\" width=\"300\" height=\"230\" srcset=\"http:\/\/legoeng.local\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/05\/Screenshot_053013_033933_PM-300x230.jpg 300w, http:\/\/legoeng.local\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/05\/Screenshot_053013_033933_PM-600x461.jpg 600w, http:\/\/legoeng.local\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/05\/Screenshot_053013_033933_PM.jpg 791w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h2>Activity 4: \u00a0Make\u00a0your robot drive in a figure 8<\/h2>\n<p>There are lots of different &#8216;figure 8&#8217;s&#8217;. Which are more\u00a0aesthetically\u00a0pleasing? \u00a0Which are more efficient?<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><a href=\"http:\/\/legoeng.local\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/05\/image.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-652 aligncenter\" src=\"http:\/\/legoeng.local\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/05\/image-300x170.jpg\" alt=\"image\" width=\"300\" height=\"170\" srcset=\"http:\/\/legoeng.local\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/05\/image-300x170.jpg 300w, http:\/\/legoeng.local\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/05\/image.jpg 1024w, http:\/\/legoeng.local\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/05\/image-600x340.jpg 600w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>In conclusion, keep it simple! You do not need a degree in programming to do effective, simple activities with robotics.<\/p>\n<p>&#8212;<br \/>\nDamien Kee<br \/>\nwww.damienkee.com<br \/>\n<em id=\"__mceDel\"><em id=\"__mceDel\"><em id=\"__mceDel\">damien@damienkee.com<\/em><\/em><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The word &#8216;robotics&#8217; can be a little intimidating to a teacher new to the field. I constantly encounter teachers who have been thrust unsuspectingly into the role of the &#8216;robotics teacher&#8217; simply because they were in the staff room at the time the Principal was looking for a volunteer. \u00a0They hear the words &#8216;robotics&#8217; and [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":24,"featured_media":652,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[99,7,128],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/legoeng.local\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/644"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/legoeng.local\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/legoeng.local\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/legoeng.local\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/24"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/legoeng.local\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=644"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/legoeng.local\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/644\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/legoeng.local\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/652"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/legoeng.local\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=644"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/legoeng.local\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=644"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/legoeng.local\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=644"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}