Published: November 21, 2009 02:33 am      

NEWFANE: Middle School team competing in Lego League

NEWFANE — When the Newfane Panther Invaders are out on the prowl, they’ll be sure to get where they’re going in a safe manner.

The team of middle schoolers are participating in the FIRST Lego League, a competition in which students have to construct and program a robot out of Legos to perform certain tasks. Running via student-written programs and made up of Legos, the robot drives along a course completing different tasks for points. The Panther Invaders are competing today in their first regional competition of the year in Churchville-Chili, near Rochester.

On Friday, the kids were putting the finishing touches on their robots and preparing for today’s event. Sixth-grader Ian Rizzo said he was having a good time while he was working on the team’s presentation for the competition.

“It’s a lot of fun,” Rizzo said.

Half of the competition involves the students attempting to solve a real-life problem, which is usually centered around a theme. For this year, the theme is “Smart Move,” in which the kids have to solve a transportation problem in their community. The kids must research a transportation problem, find a solution and make a presentation to a panel of judges. The Newfane kids are focusing on transportation safety and security.

Because of the number of kids involved, Newfane will be sending two teams of Panther Invaders. Both teams will be making their presentations on improving transportation safety, to which their solution was straightforward. Eliminate things that distract those operating a vehicle, train or plane. Rizzo and fellow sixth-grader Cole Myers came up with an idea on how to get that point across. The teams created posters that provided visuals on the their point.

“Cole and I thought of driving a car while texting, then we could ram into each other,” Rizzo said.

“I really liked working on the poster,” said seventh-grader Madi Caccamise.

They made cars out of cardboard and pretended to drive into each other. The other presentation would focus on airplane safety; the solution was to take away anything that would distract the pilots.

Team adviser and technology teacher Mark Franchini said developing a robots is a lot of trial-and-error. At a computer, students design a program that tells the robot to do something, such as go a few inches and turn right; then students download the program to the robot. It takes a lot of trial runs to get the robot to do what the team wants it to do, such as the tasks with the highest point values. When teams received the Smart Move instructions and game board eight weeks ago, they also receive a list of those tasks. Teams don’t have to try all of them, but teams usually develop a plan for which tasks to try and do.

Sixth-grader Shane Sherwood said robots can have a number of sensors on them. They include sensors that can pick up sound, color or even touch. When the sensors are activated, the robot can perform a function, such as turning if it touches something like a wall.

This is the second year Newfane has had a Lego robotics team. Franchini said the team didn’t advance past the regional qualifier last year, but he saw some excellent performances from what was a young team. Newfane was also the highest-ranked of seven rookie teams last year. But participating in FIRST has a number of benefits for students, win or lose, Franchini said.

“They get a chance to see what engineering is all about,” he said. “They learn critical skills and problem solving.”

FIRST is an acronym that means For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology. The organization has competitions for kids of all ages, including the high school robotics competition and tech challenge; a junior Lego League for ages 6 to 9; and a learning program for all ages, called FIRST Place. The Lego League is for kids ages 9 to 14.

Contact reporter Joe Olenick at 439-9222, ext. 6241.