NELSPRUIT – Close on 200 000 children from across 70 countries between the ages nine of eight and 16 years, competed internationally in the 2013 Lego League Robotics tournament. This year's challenge was Nature's Fury and teams discovered what can be done when intense natural disasters meet the places where people live, work and play. Locally, a number of teams for primary schools in the area competed at Laerskool Bergland school hall.
What made the event even more spectacular were the project displays that the teams had setup around the hall where they offered possible solutions to everyday problems with water purification, crop growing and energy saving.
The First Lego League (FLL) aims at training the minds of young scholars to think and behave in the same fashion as engineers and scientists as they work their way through various obstacles and missions, using only their robots. The teams are charged with the building, testing and programming of autonomous robots using what is called the Lego Mindstorms system.
The principle is based on the fundamentals of programming and robotics where the scholars have to map out the distance between the various points on the board, program this into the computer mainframe and download it in the form of commands to their robot. The robot is then put to the test on a map resembling a city complete with buildings, traffic and even people. The map has various missions to complete which include rescuing people and pets from tsunamis and transporting them safely to a specified zone. Other missions include breaking off tree branches to free pets and moving stranded vehicles such as ambulances out of danger's way.
A panel of judges then inspect the field map after each “game” and judge the teams accordingly – penalising them for handling the robot during play or damaging buildings that were meant to remain unscathed. The judging is comprised of three phases including the technical aspects of the robots, the teams' environmental projects and their overall core values.
All eyes were firmly fixed on the two strongest teams at the event, Tik-Tok Brains and Cybertex from Penryn Prep. Throughout the three intense rounds leading to the finals, these two squads topped the log with Tik-Tok eventually taking the win.
The top four teams from this weekend's championships will travel to Johannesburg in December to compete in the National championships at SciBono Centre. The winning teams there will fly to the United States in April next year to compete in the FLL World Festival.
