Lucy the Valiant Posted October 29, 2014 Share Posted October 29, 2014 Are these similar programs? This is our family's first year w/FLL, and I'm exploring other options (in addition to the possibility of future years with FLL). Any insight? (I guess I'm also curious about Odyssey of the Mind.) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Farrar Posted October 29, 2014 Share Posted October 29, 2014 I haven't done FLL, just DI, but I have known people who did FLL and seen part of a competition. Just off the bat, I'll tell you that Odyssey of the Mind and Destination Imagination are, for all intents and purposes, the same. They were once one organization, but they split over stuff that is not really of interest to anyone much. If you have a choice, I think DI is slightly more organized, but really they're the same and whichever is stronger/more popular near you is the one you should pick if you end up going with that. I think the big similarity between FLL and DI/OM is that they're both small teams, focused on solving a central problem and working together. That's a huge similarity in terms of what you're going to get out of the group in terms of socializing and attitude and philosophy. Both also culminate in a large competition with prizes and the chance to move on to another level. In terms of specifics, FLL is just about robotics. There's no other options. DI/OM is about a million different things. Both DI and OM have a list of several challenges you can choose and some of them are STEM focused, but some of them are arts focused. DI/OM both require kids to do a little of everything - performing is part of all challenges and at least in DI, if kids choose a more artsy central challenge, they almost always end up with a more engineering based instant challenge and vice versa - if they pick a more science and engineering based central challenge they almost always end up with an arts based instant challenge. I'm pretty sure also that FLL only has the central challenge - you're only solving one challenge and coming to the tournament with your solution. In DI/OM, you solve a central challenge and bring a prepared solution, but you also have to do an instant challenge - a super fast, think on your feet challenge that you only learn about when you get to the tournament. Vex Robotics is another organization similar to FLL. I'm happy to talk more about DI and sing its praises. If you're interested in starting a team, you should really get on the ball super fast. 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Soror Posted October 29, 2014 Share Posted October 29, 2014 Thanks for the info Farrar, we're doing FLL and loving it and it is a perfect fit for ds but I've always been curious about Destination Imagination. It sounds like something that might interest dd more. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kwg Posted October 29, 2014 Share Posted October 29, 2014 :lurk5: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
angela in ohio Posted October 29, 2014 Share Posted October 29, 2014 FLL is not just robotics. Nor is VEX similar to FLL. FLL has three components. For one, you build and program a robot based on a yearly theme. You make a presentation about the process to judges and you run the robot on a field four times. For another, you complete a project and present it to judges who then ask you questions. And for the last, you complete a surprise challenge as a team and are given feedback based on your performance. All three of the components are equally weighted in the competition. We often use DI challenges to rehearse for the FLL competition, because they are essentially the same. And my dc's first FLL coach was a prior DI coach. So I am familiar with both programs, but we haven't participated in DI. VEX is truly just a robot. It is structured more like FRC (the HS version of FLL) in that you build a robot and then compete all day in matches to determine a bracket to play for a championship. 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sassenach Posted October 29, 2014 Share Posted October 29, 2014 We do OM and Farrar pretty much covered it. If you were to choose between OM and DI, I would highly recommend choosing whichever one is bigger in your area. I think the level of organization also depends on your region. Ours is very well organized. A friend who did DI in Maryland was really disappointed in the lack of organization. I think it completely depends on who is running your region. DI does have a nicer website ;-). IMO, the kids gain a million life skills from these teams. And it's so much fun. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Farrar Posted October 29, 2014 Share Posted October 29, 2014 FLL is not just robotics. Nor is VEX similar to FLL. FLL has three components. For one, you build and program a robot based on a yearly theme. You make a presentation about the process to judges and you run the robot on a field four times. For another, you complete a project and present it to judges who then ask you questions. And for the last, you complete a surprise challenge as a team and are given feedback based on your performance. All three of the components are equally weighted in the competition. We often use DI challenges to rehearse for the FLL competition, because they are essentially the same. And my dc's first FLL coach was a prior DI coach. So I am familiar with both programs, but we haven't participated in DI. VEX is truly just a robot. It is structured more like FRC (the HS version of FLL) in that you build a robot and then compete all day in matches to determine a bracket to play for a championship. That's really interesting to know. The mini competition for FLL that we saw part of it didn't have a sort of "instant challenge" element so I didn't realize that was part of it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Farrar Posted October 29, 2014 Share Posted October 29, 2014 We do OM and Farrar pretty much covered it. If you were to choose between OM and DI, I would highly recommend choosing whichever one is bigger in your area. I think the level of organization also depends on your region. Ours is very well organized. A friend who did DI in Maryland was really disappointed in the lack of organization. I think it completely depends on who is running your region. DI does have a nicer website ;-). IMO, the kids gain a million life skills from these teams. And it's so much fun. We do DI in Maryland and it is a bit of a mess but it really depends on the region... But I couldn't even get OM to get back to us when we were first deciding which to do, so that plus the (at the time) completely ugly OM website pretty much settled it. I've been told the split was over the scoring and points issues, but I'm pretty sure sponsorship was a part of it as well because DI seemed to have caught all the best sponsors like 3M and Lockheed Martin while OM has NASA, which is prestigious but doesn't seem to help your website look awesome. But my nephew is in NY and it seems everyone in his area does OM, so that's what he does and it sounded very organized and responsive. I do think it's just whichever you end up with. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Soror Posted October 29, 2014 Share Posted October 29, 2014 FLL is not just robotics. Nor is VEX similar to FLL. FLL has three components. For one, you build and program a robot based on a yearly theme. You make a presentation about the process to judges and you run the robot on a field four times. For another, you complete a project and present it to judges who then ask you questions. And for the last, you complete a surprise challenge as a team and are given feedback based on your performance. All three of the components are equally weighted in the competition. We often use DI challenges to rehearse for the FLL competition, because they are essentially the same. And my dc's first FLL coach was a prior DI coach. So I am familiar with both programs, but we haven't participated in DI. VEX is truly just a robot. It is structured more like FRC (the HS version of FLL) in that you build a robot and then compete all day in matches to determine a bracket to play for a championship. Thanks so much. We have a rookie FLL team and I googled IC's on your recommendation and found a lot of good info to add to our team building work. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
shage Posted October 29, 2014 Share Posted October 29, 2014 That's really interesting to know. The mini competition for FLL that we saw part of it didn't have a sort of "instant challenge" element so I didn't realize that was part of it. At a FLL competition you don't see the 3 part judging (technical interview, project, core values) because it is done with judges only. Even coaches are not allowed in the room. The breakdown for awards is 1/3 project, 1/3 core values, 1/3 robot (technical interview + robot game). The robot game is the ONLY part the public sees at a FLL competition, and that is only 1/6 of the points as far as the scoring goes. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
angela in ohio Posted October 30, 2014 Share Posted October 30, 2014 At a FLL competition you don't see the 3 part judging (technical interview, project, core values) because it is done with judges only. Even coaches are not allowed in the room. The breakdown for awards is 1/3 project, 1/3 core values, 1/3 robot (technical interview + robot game). The robot game is the ONLY part the public sees at a FLL competition, and that is only 1/6 of the points as far as the scoring goes. This varies by region, though. In Ohio, the project presentation is open to the public. When my dc participated, they even took questions from the audience during the judging. Technical and core values/teamwork were closed, though. In Michigan, it varies. At some competitions, all three are open to parents/coaches. At some, they are closed to all but two coaches. But a coach is always allowed in with their students; they just aren't allowed to interact with the students or judges. Our FRC team hosts a qualifier and the state competition, and we allow two parents/coaches per judging. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
shage Posted October 30, 2014 Share Posted October 30, 2014 This varies by region, though. In Ohio, the project presentation is open to the public. When my dc participated, they even took questions from the audience during the judging. Technical and core values/teamwork were closed, though. In Michigan, it varies. At some competitions, all three are open to parents/coaches. At some, they are closed to all but two coaches. But a coach is always allowed in with their students; they just aren't allowed to interact with the students or judges. Our FRC team hosts a qualifier and the state competition, and we allow two parents/coaches per judging. Yes, after I posted I remembered that the regions have some control over this. Thanks for the clarification. I think there are some good reasons to keep the judging closed, but it does mean that the general public does not get a good feel for how FLL works. The other drawback is there is zero recourse should the judges completely confuse your team with another. (This happened to our team one year at a state level competition. It didn't matter really in the long run. But when we got the scoring sheets back months later, the team number was correct but the comments referred to the team who entered the room in the next time slot. Not helpful feedback!) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Farrar Posted October 31, 2014 Share Posted October 31, 2014 This is true for DI/OM as well because the Instant Challenge is always closed at competitions. It has to be. Team members and coaches have to sign a pledge not to talk about it in DI until after global finals beyond vague statements like, "It was fun," or "I think we did well." But they also do a good job of selling DI by going to schools and doing IC's and by pushing them at every single DI event. You can't attend something related to DI without being somehow forced into an IC. Trust me. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lucy the Valiant Posted October 31, 2014 Author Share Posted October 31, 2014 Thank you for all of these responses - exactly what I was looking for! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SoCal_Bear Posted March 30, 2015 Share Posted March 30, 2015 I know this is resurrecting an old thread...but is it possible to do FLL and DI (or OM) during the same year. Or is it way too much? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sassenach Posted March 30, 2015 Share Posted March 30, 2015 I know this is resurrecting an old thread...but is it possible to do FLL and DI (or OM) during the same year. Or is it way too much? I think it would be too much, personally. Better to start with one. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Farrar Posted March 30, 2015 Share Posted March 30, 2015 I'm not totally sure about the timing on each. If you have a kid who needs lots of activities and the tournaments are a couple of months apart then maybe. But it does seem like a lot. DI/OM is a big commitment. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Targhee Posted March 30, 2015 Share Posted March 30, 2015 I don't know the DI/OM season, but FLL runs Aug-Dec (longer if you make it to state and national competitions. We had about 5 weeks overlap between FLL and Science Olympiad, and that was really exhausting. We will do it again because they like both so much, but if you have two big creative/time intensive teams going on simultaneously it's hard to give 100% to both. You need to have a kid who is really driven and even then there's a chance of burnout. My kids are studying for state SciOly and running on fumes because they've been working nearly nonstop on their competitions since August. Oh, and then there's the possibility of conflicting event dates! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SoCal_Bear Posted March 30, 2015 Share Posted March 30, 2015 Now, the dilemma...I live in Legoland's backyard so to speak, so the league competitions are actually at Legoland. Plenty of local teams are fielded to compete there. So, the question I am weighing the merits between FLL or OM//DI? I am intrigued about the idea mentioned up thread of using IC from DI as part of FLL prep. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Targhee Posted March 30, 2015 Share Posted March 30, 2015 I used OM activities with my team to practice for FLL. They were fun, and some of the most memorable things about our practices. I bet being on an OM/DI team would be awesome! For us, however, there is a HUGE draw to the robotics/lego element. In fact, some of the kids made it a bigger priority than the project or core values. In fact, our robot design, programming, and scores at the table were amazing (our robot scored twice as many points as the second place robot). But it was really hard to get them to pull together a good project his year, and even with great robot scores they didn't advance to state (their project and core values scores were too low). But I think they realized in the end that they need to be well rounded in order to be successful, and do better next year. And I really like that about FLL - it expects you to do all the things real life project people do: do good research and communicate it well, have good design and development, and work together positively as a team. And doing the competition at Legoland would be pretty amazing :drool: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Targhee Posted March 30, 2015 Share Posted March 30, 2015 Oh, calbear, I just realized that your student is only 6. The Jr. FLL is slightly different, and I really don't know enough about it to comment. I do know that it doesn't have the same kind of direct competition as FLL. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SoCal_Bear Posted March 30, 2015 Share Posted March 30, 2015 Shannon, This is helpful...actually. I am thinking ahead. I am committed to running Jr. FLL for this year and probably the next. It's beyond that I am thinking about what to do. Switch gears and go with DI/OM or stay with FLL? If I can build in open ended problem solving practices a la DI/OM then I can imagine that would be really enriching and stretching kids to think beyond Legos/robotics. Problem solving + creativity + collaboration is important to me. Legos in itself is a huge draw and seller so to speak to kids in general. I already have enough parents/kids committed to field at least two teams at my homeschool co-op. I just don't know if OM/DI will have as much of a response from parents or kids. Decisions...decisions.... ETA: I keep being drawn toward OM/DI because it seems broader in developing skills outside a STEM focus which seems like a good thing as well. I just can't seem to make up my mind. ETA 2: And now you guys have me thinking about Science Olympiad as a viable option. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Targhee Posted March 31, 2015 Share Posted March 31, 2015 SCiOly is great for kids who can engross themselves in a subject or build project! The subject study tests are not very creative (occasionally with events like Picture This or Experimental Design). The build events you have to be very creative at. But on the while, I think FLL is more kid-driven and more open-ended. We love SciOly though ;-) I just wish there were more time in the day because I have one who wants to do Mathcounts too... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Arcadia Posted March 31, 2015 Share Posted March 31, 2015 Calbear, I know someone In 5th grade who is in the school team for Odyssey of the Mind and in FLL. I don't know how the schedule is. Odyssey of the mind is a weekly afterschool meeting/activity for school teams for my neighborhood PS and run by parent volunteers. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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