Robots Enhance Programming Skills
The middle school technology elective class has built and is programming LEGO Mindstorm robots. The robots can follow many commands — not just driving and turning, but recognizing colors, stopping a certain distance from an obstacle, and even sounding an alarm and reacting when they detect a problem.
Every Wednesday the middle school technology elective has “20% time” patterned after Google, Inc.’s employees’ work. 20% (one day each week) of their time is spent on their own technology projects. This semester most of the students in our technology elective class have chosen to work on the Mindstorm robots to challenge their own programming skills.