This is an excellent idea. Adding the 5th area of judging session for
programming.
To answer your question, the teams with 7th and 8th graders just do the
programs and they do not practice for precise position that's the reason
they do not score points when they have to do in 150 seconds. Where as the
teams with elementary kids will do more timed practice sessions.
This is what I've noticed, as I've been doing for the past 7
years...........I was a coach for my elder one and now he is doing for my
your son's team.

Thanks,
Saritha


On Mon, Nov 11, 2013 at 12:26 PM, Sujata Mohapatra <[log in to unmask]>wrote:

>
> Thanks to the all organizers, judges, volunteers for their hard work to
> make the tournament successful at Chantilly.
>
>
> I am coaching a team since last 2 years, but I I have enough experience
> from coaching teams in other STEM activities (Odyssey of the mind etc.) to
> guide a team and observe a team. If I understand correctly the main purpose
> of FLL is to motivate students to involve in STEM and apply to the real
> world. Last week our team was competing in division II in Chantilly High
> school. The team  had a sound score on all 3rd round of robot performance.
> All our team members are very focused and very interested in science,
> academically very bright. I am working with them since last 6 years and
> very proud of them. Some of the team members have 3-4 years of NXT
> programming experience. When they were practicing I realized  how much hard
> work, perfection, calculation and time management needed to get a good
> score in the tournament.  In reality most of the teams struggle with
> managing time of 150 minutes. Last week in Chantilly,most of the division
> II ( above 7 grade) could not achieve 200 points in any of the round where
> 3rd/4th grader rookie team got a consistence score in all 3 rounds above
> (250- 390). Unbelievable!
>
> Sorry to ask this question to the coaches who are programming the robot
> for their teams, Are you giving chance to the kids to learn or your main
> priority is to get an award and proceed to the next level? Definitely, FLL
> Core value does not allow this.
>
> FLL should give a spontaneous robot task to the teams to program and run
> the robot during the robot design and programming judging time to test the
> ability of the team.
>
> Thanks.
>
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