FIRST LEGO League Takes Exercise Challenge
By Ethan Ariola '26, Kevin Jie '27, and Kian McCandless '27
FIRST LEGO League (FLL) is an activity where we take on challenges. There are three different parts of FLL: Core Values, the Research Project, and the Robot Game. For Core Values, we use skills like creativity, discovery, teamwork, and more, that help us to work as a team and problem solve. For the Research Project, we find a problem based on the theme for the year that we’d like to solve, and come up with an innovative solution. The project that we’re sharing with you today is our solution. For the Robot Game, we build and program a robot to complete missions in a short amount of time, and try to get as many points as possible. The Research Project and Robot Game themes change every year. This year, the theme is called RePLAY, and focuses on exercise.
Active Artivation
Our team is Active Artivation! Our goal is to motivate people to exercise during rough times, especially when everyone has to stay home. Since the theme for this year is exercise, the mural walk was our idea for a project. We designed a mural walk with ten signs and at the eleventh and final sign will be a beautiful mural. The mural is supposed to encourage people to visit the walk. Each sign will have a Fun Fitness Fact with a colorful background to motivate the person to continue following the signs. Each sign will also inform the person on how many steps they have taken in between each sign. (Ex. Sign 1 to sign 2: 70 steps.) In addition to the facts and steps, the signs will be easily visible, being outlined by dark blue lines, for people to follow the signs. Thin sheets of plastic covering each sign will protect it from weather such as, rain, dirt, and dust.
The Tournament
The Regional Tournament is where all the teams from around Tucson come and engage in friendly competition. Teams share their projects and ideas with the judges, and show their core values throughout the tournament, as well as doing a teamwork exercise. This demonstrates your teamwork and individual contributions. Teams get three attempts at their robot run. The best score will be taken (for example, if your scores were 45, 87 and 40, the 87-point score would be taken). After all the parts are completed, the ceremony will commence. Here, everyone gets a medal, and the people going to state will be announced. We are excited about qualifying to make it to the State Tournament! We were also recognized for our exceptional Core Values and were the only team to receive the Core Values award.
