shawthorne44 Posted August 21, 2018 Share Posted August 21, 2018 DD is a new 3rd grader. DH and I were big city/giant suburb people until we moved to small town farm country. We went to a 4H intro meeting yesterday, and several projects looked really interesting. I swore that I'd limit her to one project, but we are thinking three now. One is robotics. A mom I know mentioned that they use Lego Robotic kits, so I looked them up on Amazon. That is expensive! How does this work? DD is at my parent's now and so wasn't at the meeting. Now I'm not sure I want to mention it to her. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
desertflower Posted August 21, 2018 Share Posted August 21, 2018 From our experience (and i don't know if this is for every 4h club) , the leader of the robotics club had about 5 or 6 robots. 2 new ones (the ev3). How he had so many i don't know. Donations probably. It is free for 4h'ers. Hth Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wheres Toto Posted August 21, 2018 Share Posted August 21, 2018 An established club will probably already have what they need. If it's a new club, there are grants available for things like that. One of the tenets of 4-H is that nobody can be turned away for being unable to pay. Clubs can ask for a suggested supply donation but they can't make it a requirement. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HomeAgain Posted August 22, 2018 Share Posted August 22, 2018 Ds does robotics with 4-H. His club uses everything there, and it belongs to the club/leader. They don't use Lego robotics, but go through a different series where they are building from scratch and learning how to manipulate motors and such. However, if you do it on your own, I know 4-H has a robotics curriculum that is cheap and uses mostly easy to get items. They do have one for Mindstorms, but they also have what is called Junk Drawer Robotics for about $8 a book. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rachel Posted August 22, 2018 Share Posted August 22, 2018 Our 4H club owns the kits. We pay a small ($10?) fee each year to participate. I would encourage you to call your agent and ask any questions, most are pretty friendly. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
shawthorne44 Posted August 22, 2018 Author Share Posted August 22, 2018 (edited) Ok, thank you! I think I am safe to mention it to DD then. I know that there is an existing project. We just went to a 'This is what 4H is/does' meeting where they mention the projects that the group does. Parents asked the officers (teens) questions about it. The kid that happened to get the "How much time commitment?" was on the Lego Robotics team. He blushed and said 'Well, on the lego team we all live within 4 miles of each other, so we probably met 4 times a week, which is too much...." So, I know that the Project is very active. It wasn't until the end of the meeting, that a mom friend of an active teen mentioned the Lego Robot kits, so I didn't get a chance to ask the lego-boy. Edited August 22, 2018 by shawthorne44 Clicked enter before I was ready. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rachel Posted August 22, 2018 Share Posted August 22, 2018 45 minutes ago, shawthorne44 said: Ok, thank you! I think I am safe to mention it to DD then. I know that there is an existing project. We just went to a 'This is what 4H is/does' meeting where they mention the projects that the group does. Parents asked the officers (teens) questions about it. The kid that happened to get the "How much time commitment?" was on the Lego Robotics team. He blushed and said 'Well, on the lego team we all live within 4 miles of each other, so we probably met 4 times a week, which is too much...." So, I know that the Project is very active. It wasn't until the end of the meeting, that a mom friend of an active teen mentioned the Lego Robot kits, so I didn't get a chance to ask the lego-boy. Oh goodness, our team does not meet that frequently! They meet once a month until the competition gets closer and then a couple times a week until about two weeks before the competition. Our kids only do a district meet and the state fair. Some of the older kids in the state do more competitions. I will say that our 4H agent needs more help with this club and so it’s pretty laid back. My husband and I have discussed volunteering to lead it next year but neither of us knows much about programming. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
shawthorne44 Posted August 22, 2018 Author Share Posted August 22, 2018 Based on the boy's blush, I suspect that they thought of it as Lego Play, and an adult probably wasn't in the room. And, honestly, if there was a group of 4H kids that met at our house a few times a week, I wouldn't mind buying a robot kit. DH is a Lego-nut and I'm a programmer, and playing with it would be good for her. But, if we had to pay $100 for our part of a shared robot kit that she played with a total of 5 times, that is entirely different thing and too much money. I looked at the Project-Competition pdf, and it looked cute. The one I looked at had the robots doing Poop Cleanup. The 'Poop' being bolts. Then the robots delivered Hay, the hay being a roll of tape. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
merylvdm Posted August 28, 2018 Share Posted August 28, 2018 On 8/22/2018 at 1:17 PM, Rachel said: Oh goodness, our team does not meet that frequently! They meet once a month until the competition gets closer and then a couple times a week until about two weeks before the competition. Our kids only do a district meet and the state fair. Some of the older kids in the state do more competitions. I will say that our 4H agent needs more help with this club and so it’s pretty laid back. My husband and I have discussed volunteering to lead it next year but neither of us knows much about programming. I would say it could be a plus if you don't know much about programming - it will force the kids to figure it out for themselves. I coached an inner city First Lego League (robotics) team for 3 years. I am a programmer and teach programming - but I don't know the language used by the EV3 robots. And I intentionally didn't try to learn it. The kids knew I didn't know it and that forced them to figure it out. And FLL is all about the kids doing all the work and not the coaches. Their robot never did all the things it was supposed to, but it did perform many of the tasks. And in the 3rd year, they did well enough to get through to State. They felt so proud of what they had achieved because they knew I hadn't done any of it! 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
shawthorne44 Posted August 28, 2018 Author Share Posted August 28, 2018 I will remember that. I try hard to be hands off. I think when parents do too much it is like when someone helps a butterfly out of its cocoon. Their wings are never as strong as they would have been. It is hard, though, in things I am good at. DD sewed her first skirt and it was exhausting (for me). All that 'letting it go' was hard work. For many years, I've taken an informal poll at fabric store pattern book tables. A huge percentage of sewers did NOT have a parent that sewed. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Join the conversation
You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.