How K-12 Students Can Participate in National Robotics Week from Home
The COVID-19 outbreak has caused many National Robotics Week events to be postponed or canceled. In their absence, here are virtual items kids can use to celebrate!
RoboWeek is offering a film called “Me and My Robot,” that highlights young roboticists from 65 countries competing in the World Robot Olympiad, an international robotics competition for youth. Kids can also design their own robots from home using Legos. The Me and My Robot website provides a Virtual Robotics Toolkit and free instructional videos.
The National Robotics Week website lists some cool sites for kids interested in robotics:
- iRobot STEM – A list of resources on STEM fields
- Robots.ieee.org – Meet nearly 200 robots from across the word
- Hour of Code Robotics and Circuits – Robotics and computer science activities (some include simulations)
- Nova Resources – How do robots do things? Learn all about how they perform different tasks
- Which Robot Are You? – What kind of robot are you? Take this quiz and find out
In the United Kingdom, the annual UK Robotics Celebration is hosting two robot drawing and storytelling competitions for primary school kids:
- “Draw a Robot” competition: children ages 5-7 draw a robot that can tackle any task or job they’d like
- “Once Upon a Robot” writing competition, kids ages 7-11 pen an 800 word story starring a fictional robot that lives here on Earth or in a distant galaxy.
Also in the U.K., the national School Robot Competition, formed through a partnership between the UK Robotics and Autonomous Systems and Twinkl, challenges students ages 8-14 to design virtual robots that can traverse “challenging space environments.” Winners will receive a MiRo-E robot.
TryEngineeing Live
TryEngineering Live: Hands-On Design Challenge is a new virtual series from TryEngineering and the TryEngineering Summer Institute.
In this series, we will be highlighting lesson plans from TryEngineeirng.org.
TryEngineering.org inspires the engineers of tomorrow and empowers educators to foster the next generation of technology innovators by making it easy to bring engineering into the classroom.
With access to over 130 complete, low-cost lesson plans for students ages 5-18, integrating engineering concepts and cultivating engineering habits of mind couldn’t be easier.
Each lesson plan is designed to be a complete roadmap that’s easy to follow and implement, no matter your familiarity with the topic, and to align with educational standards.
Join us for our first event on 16 April 2020 at 12pm titled, “TryEngineering Live: Hands-On Critical Design Challenge – Critical Load”.