Boonslick Building Club: July 2009

Wednesday, July 22, 2009

Robotics Summer Camp

This summer, we had two 1-week camps to build and program NXTs. Thanks to the kids who attended (and their parents!), we were able to purchase the NXT kit for next year's club. The best part was working with the NXT, especially when the kids came up with their own programs.

Tribot

We began by talking about the difference between machines and robots and why a program is so important. We started with Tribot to learn the basics of programming and the functions of the sensors. After several days of building and modifying, the first group built Spike (the robotic scorpion). The second group built RoboArm.

Get the flash player here: http://www.adobe.com/flashplayer

(If you can't see the pictures, you can look at them and some additional videos on Flickr)

Carson built a program for Spike that let the robot walk around the table:

As a special treat, Tyler brought his fuel cell model car:

Monday, July 20, 2009

Links of Interest

All of the following links will navigate you away from this blog.

Lego

LEGO
Building Instructions Download PDFs of models. Search by series, name, or model number.
Brickipedia A Lego wiki (online encyclopedia)
The Brothers Brick

Mindstorm NXT

The NXT Step Blog by multiple, multinational contributors.
Videos

NXT Sequencer by Damien Kee. A great example of a fun way to use the NXT (and I like the tune).

NXT Programs Fun programs for one NXT kit

Robotics Challenges

Moonbots, Summer 2010

Other Programming

Scratch

More Fun Stuff

Lego

BIONICLEsector01 A Bionicle wiki

Bricklink A "unofficial marketplace." This is a link to their reference page/catalog. You can find exhaustive information for sets and components, including part numbers and images.