Tackling Everything And More!

So what's next?
Even though our team didn't move on from our regional tournament this year, it doesn't mark the end of the robotics season for us. We are still super excited for our project and hope to see just how far we can take our innovative solution. Winning the innovative solution award really inspired and encouraged us. Currently we are looking into getting a provisional patent and applying for the Global Innovation Award. Wouldn't that be crazy cool?!

We are looking forward to participating in one more "mini 4-H tournament" as well. Seeing as we are a 4-H team, after the holidays we plan to group back together and prepare for our upcoming 4-H judging. Then summer plans have yet to be made, but we usually keep active in the community with displays and demonstrations at fairs and local events and gathering general background research for next year's theme.

So keep an eye out for #4889 T.E.A.M. Dia-Get-It!

Hey, Why Not?! :D

What about sectionals? Yep, we were there!
...No, we didn't go to compete.
We went to have fun and encourage other teams!

Our coaches and mentors donned the classy red judges shirts and suited up in the cool striped referee shirts while we sported the snazzy blue volunteer shirts. But that's not all! On Saturday, December 13th, seven nifty hats and creative costumes bustled about the tournament. We love having fun and showing our FLL enthusiasm! We know from experience how awesome it is when a volunteer can put a smile on someone's face. So we all dressed up in goofy hats, clown noses, stick-on mustaches, and more! It was great!

...I think we started something awesome... We will definitely have to do it again. Who knows, maybe all the volunteers will pick up on it and before long, we'll get everyone grinning from ear to ear all the day long!

We truly had a terrific time. Not only did we get to encouraged other teams, they encouraged us too! It's been an amazing season filled with incredible people and memorable experiences. Can't wait for the state tournament!!!

Trying on hats!

A Square of Friends :)

We have fun outside of FLL too! Today we went to see the movie Big Hero 6 together. We all had a great time and enjoyed the movie and its themes of robotics and friendship building.

We take the FLL core values to heart and the seven of us really bonded this year. Though we live in different counties, attend different 4-H clubs, and are all different ages, FLL brought us together. We were more than just an FLL team. We became close-knit friends.

In fact we incorporated that on the robotics competition field! This year one of the missions was to build and deliver a unique apprenticeship model. We built ours in team colors with minifigs sitting inside a circle. ...Only our model was square, so we called it our square of friends. ;)

Our Tournament!!!

       Our team competed this past Sunday at the Marquette regional tournament. We did a great job and had a ton of fun. Unfortunately, our lead robot driver was unable to attend the tournament. To represent our missing team member we put a Lego mini figure on the front of the robot.

T.E.A.M. with mini Alex queued and ready to go for interviews

       After we set up or pit display, we had interviews. First, was the project interview which went great despite a few missing props. Thankfully, we were able to recover smoothly and finish the presentation. In the Q and A afterward the judges only had two questions and were able to dismiss us to our next interview early.

Our Pit!

Preparing for Interviews     

      While we were waiting for our next interview, we realized we had forgotten our laptop down at our pit table. After retrieving the laptop from the pits, our team was ready to go. We had one of the best robot design interviews we have had yet! All the team members from head programmers to skit writers had something great to add to the conversation. The programmers wowed the judges with how well they understood the robot code and their effective use of the gyro sensor.

Running the robot

At the practice tables

        After the robot interview, we just had our core values interview left. The teamwork exercise went great and the judges were impressed with how organized our team was. After a short Q and A the interviews were over and we just had robot matches left.

Sitting with other teams in the audience

The Robot Stage

       In our first robot match we scored 69 points and we were in 10th place. Afterward, we got some time on the practice tables and worked on some quick fixes to our programs. Then, we headed off to our second robot match. This time we scored 40 points and were in 22nd. After programming another quick mission to help us score a little higher we went back for our third robot match. The programs ran almost perfectly but our score was only 66 points. Afterward, we found out that one of the mission models had been built incorrectly and had undone a task. However, it was too late to do anything about it so we remained in 22nd place. A bit disappointed, we headed off to the award ceremony.

In the Pit

T.E.A.M. Huddle

       At the award ceremony our team won the Innovative Solution award which quickly restored our spirits! Though we didn't move on to sectionals we still had a ton of fun and, as always, we headed off for some ice cream to celebrate.

#4889 T.E.A.M. Dia-Get-It - Thumbs up!

See the rest of our tournament photos on our Picassa page.

Survey About Diabetic Education

We are super excited about our research project this year! 

Our team discovered that some newly diagnosed Type 1 Diabetics struggle in their diabetic classes to understand everything they need to know about their disease. Current teaching methods just aren't effective enough. We asked ourselves, "How can we help newly diagnosed Type 1 Diabetics understand and learn to manage their diabetes in a fun way?"

We are working with several professionals and expert teams who assist us in research and developing ideas for our innovative solution. Wanna help too? Now you can!

Please, take a survey! We have designed three different surveys, about 10 questions each, to help us gather statistics and information we need to solve this ever-growing problem. You can find links to our surveys listed below. To get started, select one that applies to you!

Thanks so much for all your help! It means a lot to us!

• For the Type 1 Diabetic: https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/DFBS9ZZ

• For each caregiver of a Type 1 Diabetic (past and present): https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/DFQGTNX

• For professionals and leaders who have contact with Type 1 Diabetics: https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/9NNLM88

For more information about our team, check our team photos and videos.

T.E.A.M. #4889

FIRST changed how they do team numbers. Instead of receiving a new number every year, now the number a team gets is what they keep for as long as they are a team.

We are team number 4889!

Below is a list of all the team numbers we have had:

• #2659  -  (Year 2007, team name: Solar Revenge)
• #4184  -  (Year 2008, team name: Solar Revenge)
• #4801  -  (Year 2009, team name: T.E.A.M.)*
• #3176  -  (Year 2010, team name: T.E.A.M. F.I.R.S.T. Aid)**
• #4877  -  (Year 2011, team name: T.E.A.M. Temp-Assure)*
• #1544  -  (Year 2012, team name: T.E.A.M. Dose-E-Dough)*
• #244  -  (Year 2013, team name: T.E.A.M. Flash Drivez)*
• #4889  -  (Year 2014, team name: T.E.A.M. Dia-Get-It)*

*T.E.A.M. stands for Tackling Everything And More
** Our F.I.R.S.T. stood for Frequent Information Response and Safety Team

Volunteering at the Waukesha FLL Tournament

Our team is a 4-H team from Waukesha County. On November 1st, there was an FLL tournament at Waukesha South High School. Three of our current team members, all three of our youth mentors, our coach, several past team members, as well as other 4-H members all volunteered at the tournament. 

Here we are at the tournament: some current team members and our youth mentors.

Our team members volunteering at the Waukesha FLL Tournament.

Playing some Ninja during a break.

Playing some Ninja during a break.

Teamwork

We always look forward to practicing teamwork exercises, they are lots of fun! Our coaches like to be creative and come up with all sorts of silly challenges, like hopping around the yard... Here, take a look for yourself!  :D

Check out our YouTube channel for more videos! 
http://www.youtube.com/user/FLLRobotics

An Update!

Discussing efficiency and team goals

We have been keeping busy and having lots of fun!
We practice time management by grouping into subteams each meeting to accomplish our team goals efficiently.

Testing an idea

We finished programing our myblocks library and mission programming is underway! The robot subteam is furthering their knowledge and skills by trying out some in-depth programming concepts this year. The lead programmers help mentor the less experienced ones. We found a couple robot modifications we need to make, but we are up to that challenge.

Field trip to work with a professional

The project subteam has completed the planning and designing of our project. They went on field trips to meet with professionals in the field and learned a lot. Now we are working closely with one expert who is thrilled with our innovative solution and is helping us find resources to actually make our project a reality! Isn't that super cool? Currently we are working diligently to write a creative skit to share in the community and present to judges. So far it is looking great!

Working together

We have also been practicing fun teamwork exercises and core values interview prep. We know how important it is to have an even balance on all three aspects of FLL, robot, project, and core values. Through teamwork exercises and fun games during meeting breaks, we have really bonded as a team and friendships have grown.




We have kept active outside of meeting times too!

A few completed models

Our coaches and mentors are involved with the FRC team, CORE, who run an FLL tournament every year. This year we helped them assemble the mission models for the competition fields used for upcoming tournaments.

At the scrimmage

We participated in a scrimmage in Cudahy with 7 other teams. It was a great opportunity to prepare and practice for our regional tournament. Here is a link to pictures of us at the scrimmage:
https://picasaweb.google.com/11278502105
3295249322/Scrimmage20141028

At 4-H

We also have plans to present our project in the community in a few different ways. Besides the usual general sharing we do individually, we are scheduled to meet with a team of experts and a 4-H club.




We can't wait for tournament season to begin and are looking forward to the Waukesha regional where many of our team members, coaches, and mentors will be volunteering.

Everything is pulling together and we are all excited for our regional tournament which is just a few weeks away!

A Teamwork Exercise

Madeline came up with another fun teamwork exercise for us. It was a little different than what we usually do. It's good to practice different things that make us think, plan, and respond in new ways.

Team Building and Subteams

On Wednesday our team had a great meeting. We started off together to discuss our project as a team. After we had figured our where we wanted to direct our research, we headed outside and worked on team building by playing a super fun version of tag.

When we went back inside, we dispersed into our separate sub-teams. One group worked on finishing up our strategy for the robot game board, while the other group spent some time learning about one of our two project ideas.

At the end of the meeting, we all met back up and shared what we had learned with the team. The robot group had planned out all the missions and come up with a prototype of a super handy attachment that works for all the missions we have planned for the robot runs!

      

Teamwork Exercise

We have a lot of fun practicing our Five Step Decision Making Process during meetings. Our coaches come up with some really fun things for us to do. This is only our second Teamwork Exercise this season.

Rookies Learn Programming

Our rookie team members are learning to program the EV3 and they're having a lot of fun!

Here are two team members as they program their first-ever programs. They had to program the robot to go forward until the light sensor detects the line. Then it was supposed to "celebrate and dance."

And the later they learned to program using loops. One of our more experienced team members worked with them to teach them to use sensors and loops.

Our World Class T.E.A.M.

 With every new season comes new team members and this year our team is excited to be welcoming three of them! Our newest team members are Alanna, Christopher, and Kenneth. Great new additions that fit right in with our returning members: Alex, Jessica, Peyton, and Avery. We also have three former team members that have graduated out of FLL and now are returning as mentors: Madeline and Curtis who have been mentoring for three years, and Spencer who just graduated from the team.

 Our team kicked off the year with a meeting the night the project was released. This way we could start our brainstorming process as soon as possible. With a marker board and dry-erase marker in hand, we spent the meeting coming up with different ideas. By the time the meeting was over, the board was filled with tons of different problems and ideas for our project.

At our next meeting we built this year's robot field! After about two hours of building and a pizza party, the board was finally done! When the board was finished, we had a short team meeting until the parents arrived. We had another short brainstorming session and came up with a whole bunch of ideas. Then we discussed possible robot designs and what sort of chassis would work best for this year's board.

On Thursday night some of our team members got the opportunity to learn more advanced programming from another team (last year known as the Glow-Getters). We had a great meeting with them and learned some great tips for programming the gyro sensor and at being more accurate, more consistently. It was awesome to be able to work with another team and see each other work with out all the pressure of the tournament. Thanks Glow-Getters!

Be sure to check back here to hear how our team is doing! You can also see our team by visiting our YouTube channel or check out some fun pictures of our team through out the season!

Summer Fun at the County Fair

Over the summer our team presented FLL at the Waukesha County Fair. The FRC team, CORE 2062, was also there. We talked with many youth and families.