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First Lego League in Virginia and DC

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Sender: First Lego League in Virginia and DC <[log in to unmask]>
Date: Thu, 6 May 2010 11:59:53 -0400
Reply-To: Phil Smith III <[log in to unmask]>
From: Phil Smith III <[log in to unmask]>
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Comments: To: Rusty West <[log in to unmask]>
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I am indeed still on this list! The Capital Girls were a blast to coach. They're all graduating from high school this year!

 

Girls are different (there's a late-breaking story!), and have fewer fistfights. For the Girls, 6-8 was the right size. When we were a school team, we had 10 because the school quite reasonably wanted to maximize opportunity; once they hit middle school and there was no more interest from the school, we went private and got a bit smaller, which was indeed easier to manage. Someone said 4; I think that's a bit small, though of course it'll vary depending on how focused the kids are. There was a team a couple of years ago where the coach and all but two kids quit, and the two very-focused and intense surviving, self-coached boys were VERY competitive. But that's the exception.

 

Welcome, anyway, and enjoy!

-- 

Phil Smith III

Virginia State Judge Advisor, 2007, 2008, 2009

Judge Advisor, Northern Virginia Regional tournaments, 2007, 2008, 2009

Division 1 Judge Advisor, Virginia State tournament, 2006

 

Coach, The Capital Girls, Oak Hill (retired)

Team 1900 (2002)

Team 2497 (2003)

Team 2355 (2004)

Team 1945 (2005)

 

From: First Lego League in Virginia and DC [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Rusty West
Sent: Thursday, May 06, 2010 11:34 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: [VADCFLL-L] ALL GIRLS TEAM

 

Lloyd,

Our school has had an all girls team for about 6 years.  It has been great for getting more girls involved as when we had mixed teams a lot of girls were timid about coming to tryouts.  Now we get about 15-20 girls trying out for 6 spots on the team.  There used to be a girls team "Capitol Girls" and they were amazing and very successful. I am not sure if their coach still monitors the listserv.   Our girls team has been to state more than our boys team.  Our experience is that the girls enjoy the research project and teamwork exercises and the boys are more about building and programming the robot.   We get the teams to critique each other and that is very helpful.

 

Rusty West

Gloucester, VA

 

  _____  

From: First Lego League in Virginia and DC [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Lloyd O'Hara
Sent: Thursday, May 06, 2010 9:47 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: [VADCFLL-L] New team questions

 

I am in the process of trying to form an all girls, neighborhood team so my daughter can get involved.  I helped coach my son's teams in years gone by but I have not coached a team for a couple years now.

From what I can remember, I would have to agree completely with what Robert said, especially about the team size.  The younger the team members the harder it is for them to focus and for you, as the coach, to keep meetings under control and its a lot easier trying to maintain order with fewer team members.  I will also say, from my limited experience, smaller teams are actually easier to coach for any of the age levels.  Once you get towards ten team members, it is easier for things to get out of hand.

My ultimate hope for the team will be for them to have fun while learning something they can build on next year, if the choose to participate again, or use somewhere else in their school careers. 

Of course, all of this hinges on getting a team together.  I've registered and paid the dollars, including a new Mindstorms kit.  I now have an extra incentive to get a team going.

Thanks,

Lloyd
Prospective coach





May 6, 2010 08:07:02 AM, [log in to unmask] wrote:

See my answers below you questions.

On Thu, May 6, 2010 at 8:37 AM, Matthew Cuba wrote:

> Well, hopefully this is the place to ask these questions.  I'm sure someone
> will chime in if it isn't.

It sure is!!

> I'm looking to start an FLL at my son's middle school here in Spotsylvania,
> VA.  I'm in the very beginning stages of this right now - talking with the
> school's Principal and doing a lot of reading. All of this is new to me.  Of
> course, funding will be a BIG challenge.  Realistically, we probably won't
> get going until the beginning of the school year (late August) though I
> might be able to get an informational meeting put together before the school
> lets out for summer.

If you are building a team from scratch, the sooner you get started, the better!

> What is a reasonable timeline for a new team and a new coach?  Can I
> realistically assemble the team when school starts in the Fall and meet once
> a week after school and have sufficient time?

I would focus on how you are going to get your team members together,
and start your informational meetings now before school ends. Get the
word out. Then in August, you can focus on getting commitments from
members. A lot of it depends on your goals. If you are interested in
results, you really can't be building a team in September, even early
September. If you are, you pretty much have run out of time.

> I'm hoping to come up with funding for at least two robots.  Should this
> drive the number of team members?  Should I limit the team size to < 10 in
> this case?  I'd hate to turn anyone away who is interested but I'm wondering
> if logistically too many kids and not enough robots will be a problem.  It
> would seem that 5 kids to 1 robot would be too high, but I don't know that
> for a fact.

Certainly, the more robots you have the better, but unless you have a
good source of easy to obtain money (ie, grants or parents willing to
pony up lots of cash) you probably should set your goal as one robot.
Fielding a startup team is expensive, with the table, robot and
registration costs (among other costs). With a young team, all of the
kids want to work on the robot. With an older team, the kids will
figure out what they like better and will often group themselves into
project and robot sub specialties.

Regarding age, if you are a fielding a young team, I would either get
lots of help from parents OR limit the number of kids on the team to 5
or less. Young kids can be very difficult to manage given the
compressed nature of the program. Again, some of this is dependent
upon your goals. When I coach, I want the kids to learn something
*and* actually show some results. Some coaches don't worry about
results. To me, if the team time is just "messing around", then they
don't need me as a coach -- they can just mess around at someones
house and leave the (FL)Lego stuff out of it.

> Are there any clinics or meetings that would be useful for a new coach to
> attend within 50 miles of Fredericksburg, VA?  I see there is an expo in
> D.C. in May.  Looks interesting.  Do I have to have registered as a team
> prior to attending?   Not sure we'll have funding worked out by then.

Someone else will have to answer this, but I can tell you that the
VADCFLL is very good about having new coach clinics around the DC/VA
area. I'm not 100% sure about the timing of them, but I would strongly
suggest attending a clinic to get good understanding of what you are
getting yourself into.

Good luck!!

-- 
Haskins Family Farm
Middletown, VA
blog: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Middletown-VA/Haskins-Family-Farm/114984971161
web site: http://www.localharvest.org/farms/M20435

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