- 1. Trinity Robotics as an apprenticeship Joe Pouliot Science
Instructor Trinity High School Manchester, NH
2. My Educational Path
- Earned BS in Math Ed from UNH in 1980
- Taught Math in ME and the Seacoast
- Returned to UNH while being Mr. Mom
- Began working at Trinity in 1998 as a Physical Science
instructor
- Took over Physics classes in 2003
- Created Advanced Competitive Science in 2004
3. Trinity High School
- Small Private Parochial school in Manchester, NH
- Roughly 450 students in attendance
- College Preparatory Curriculum
- 98 to 99% of seniors are accepted into colleges
- Roughly 8% study engineering w/ another 8 to 10 % studying
biological science and medicine.
4. Trinity Robotics
- Trinitys FIRST team was established in 1997, but wallowed in
obscurity until 2003
- In 2000, Dan Larochelle joined the team and soon after
intelitek returned to the FIRST scene after a brief hiatus.
- Very successful FRC team, generally known as the best 2 ndplace
team in NE.
- Roughly 25 students work on the team during any one year.
5. Advanced Competitive Science
- Began as ACS I in 2004 with Lego Mindstorm kits.The prime
reason was to teach C programming for use in FRC.
- ACS II was instituted the next year using the VEX robotics kit
and EasyC.
- In 2006, the Vex robotic kit and REC were used exclusively in
ACS I and ACS II.
6. REC in ACS
- ACS is a Project Based Learning course that uses robotics to
teach engineering and programming.
- REC I is used in ACS I while ACS II uses REC II.
- ACS diverges from REC as robotics competitions occur, such as
WPIs Savage Soccer or the VRC.
- Students who are not involved with the Robotics team can
compete in a number of events.
- The competitions allow students to work collaboratively yet
competitively with each other.
- Out of large numbers of competitors, one or two designs become
truly noteworthy.
7. Nostrila 2004 WPI Savage Soccer 8.
9. 10. 2009 Trinity FRC Robot 11. Team Sprinkles 2007 Savage
Soccer North 12. BenchPressFTC -2008 13. 14.
15.
- Simone -Savage Soccer 2008
16. VRC Clean Sweep 2009 17. 18. 19. Project Based Learning
- Authentic real world problem solving
- Capture students interest (engagement).
- Provokes serious thinking
- Teacher as coach and facilitator, no longer the authority
- Student directed learning
- The projects are the curriculum
- Competitions as ill defined problems
20. Project Based Learning
- Teacher guidance fades as group members gain confidence with
the subject matter and become more competent with the learned
procedures.
- As learning progresses the problem is adjusted by adding
components to make the problem more realistic and more
difficult.
- This progression motivates learners as they gain expertise,
responsibility, and ownership.
- This is often referred to as scaffolding.
21. Scaffolding of solutions
- Worked examples of robots and simple C code
- Goal free problems; completion suffices
- Scaffolding takes place by gradually increasing the difficulty
of the problem solving with each successive project.
- The eventual outcome is a student centered project.
- They design and build their own competitive robot.
22. The Physics of Robotics
- The structure of the robot itself sets the pace and the format
for introducing various physical concepts.
- Batteries and motors are addressed late in the senior year, if
at all, but comes first in REC I.
- Circular motion and rolling require an early introduction.
- Force, work, torque, and mechanical advantager become everyday
terms when working with robots.
- By the time a students takes a course in physics, the
vocabulary and formulas are not new, thereby making the learning
more concrete.
- The ultimate goal is produce future engineers.
23. Robotics Competitions as PBLs
- FIRST Robotics Competition (FRC)
- FIRST Tech Challenge (FTC)
- VEX Robotics Competition (VRC)
- WPIs Savage Soccer Competition
24. The Future of Education
- Collaborative teaching strategies
- Personalized learning using household technology
- Just in time learning/whenever and wherever- mobile
computing
- Critical thinking and complex problem solving
- Simple augmented reality/ LEGOs digital boxhttp://
www.youtube.com/watch?v =mUuVvY4c4-A&feature= player_embedded #
!
25. Phil Sheppard working on scissors lift 26. Tom Kroll working
on roller claw 27. Dave Pounds working on articulating claw 28.
Gerid Paquette working on gragger mechanism 29. Robert Desmarais
working on his monster 4-bar and pneumatic claw 30. Conclusion
- What started out as a seasonal game has become a year round
educational endeavor.
- As the level of experience and responsibility increases from
year to year so does the difficulty of the tasks encountered the
student.
- By their senior year, students can have experience in
machining, CAD, mechanical design, computer programming, etc.
- Trinity students have a pronounced head start in critical
thinking, engineering, and college.
31. 2010 Trinity FRC robot 32. 33. 2010 Trinity Drive Team at
the FIRST Championships 34.
35.