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As John notes, there’s lots of cross-pollination from tournaments. What’s critical (again, echoing what John wrote) is that the kids do the work. As Head Judge at tournaments, I’ve seen coaches who won’t let the kids touch the robot in practice; I also once found a coach happily sitting by himself in the pits programming the robot while his team ran around. I approached him – wearing my judging finery – and said Hi; he responded in kind, didn’t seem to have any awareness that he was transgressing. And no, that team’s robot had not just scored a 400!

Phil Smith III

Coach, The Capital Girls (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 John Barrett
Sent: Friday, August 24, 2012 10:42 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: [VADCFLL-L] Idea exchanging between teams

Dave,

I don't run multiple teams, but I think the scenario you describe is acceptable. Why? Well, the work needs to be the kids own work, that is true. But a common and expected practice at tournaments is to see the work other teams have done. Kids remember interesting solutions from one year to the next and will employ some of these concepts in their new designs. Likewise, there has been talk about having teams scrimmage before any tournaments. I would expect the same sort of outcome. In my experience, unless your teams are building the exact same robot, they won't be able to "steal" another team's design. Sharing (intentional or not) may spark some creative juices and help them see a solution for their own robot that they otherwise may have never thought about. And isn't that really what this is all about?

John

--

John J. Barrett
Industrial Medium Software, Inc.
1616 Anderson Road
McLean, VA 22102

(c) 703-231-5094
(p) 703-286-0818
(f) 703-286-0888

http://www.industrialmedium.com

On Aug 24, 2012, at 9:58 AM, David Lawrence wrote:

Hi,

Thanks again to everyone who responded to my earlier post about multiple teams. You've given us the confidence to go ahead and run two teams this year. I do have a question regarding the rules that I'm hoping someone can clarify:

One of my other coaches and I have had children involved in Odyssey of the Mind where they drill into you the very strict rule about no "Outside Assistance". Basically, everything done in preparation for the competition and at the competition must originate from the team members only and all must be there. No collaboration with either students or parents outside of the team is allowed concerning the project. For FLL, this seems to be not quite so strict.

My question is: If I have two teams practicing in the same room and a pair of kids, one from each team, work together on a challenge solution, can both teams use that solution in the competition? What if one team just sees another team's solution and tries to implement it themselves?

Thanks in advance,

-Dave

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