The

Gyro MAniacs

2020-2021 season

aboutus

We have a mix of experience levels on our team this year. Some of our members are 3 year veterans coming back for their 4th and final season, while for some it is their first year of FLL. You might think there would be a disconnect between those people, but we think our differences make us stronger. We were able to learn and grow together! This year with the chaos that the COVID-19 pandemic has caused, we had to take extra precautions when meeting together in person, and we had to get accustomed to meeting online as well. Although there were some new team members, we grew to become great friends, a family of sorts. We would often find ourselves coming together outside of meetings to play video games together. Even when we would have disputes within the team, we always ended up forgiving each other, and finding ways to avoid these arguments. We went on walks and bike rides together, both to support our Innovation Project, but also to spend time with each other. In the end we made it farther than any team from our school has made it before, and we couldn’t be prouder!

2019-2020 season

What Is FLL?

FIRST® LEGO® League, or FLL for short, is a program for kids ages 9 to 14 to have a fun time exploring robots, programming, research, and core values. Every year, a theme is set, determining the challenges in which teams around the globe must complete. This year the theme was Into Orbit. Each team that participates must have at least 2 and a maximum of 10 people on their team with at least 2 coaches. At a certain date, competitions are held based on the theme and a few successful, hard-working teams will advance to further tournaments, all the way to the National level.

For the research project, the team have to find a problem relevant to the theme and requirements and then solve it. This year for research we had to find a problem that astronauts would experience after a long term flight in space. Then our team had to find a solution for it in a new and innovative way. Past challenges have had to do with water, animals, climate, recycling and much more. Who knows what the challenge will be next year?

For the robot game- we build our robot and then program it with EV3 to do missions that once again follow the theme of into orbit. The missions are preset and all we do is program the robot to complete them.

The Core Values are the most important part of FLL. They are the principles that we learn and follow all throughout the season and take with us to become better people. This year they are Discovery, Innovation, Inclusion, Teamwork, Impact, and Fun and as always Cooperation and Gracious professionalism. Cooperation means that even though we are competing against other teams we always try to help them and improve their day. Then we apply in our meetings and outside of them.