WTMCassandra Posted December 7, 2008 Share Posted December 7, 2008 Two First Lego League teams in our region are homeschool teams out of a total of 17 teams, and both homeschool teams are moving up to state! Even though we were a rookie team, we shocked ourselves and everyone else by winning the overall award for our region and a robot performance award. To be fair, I think a lot of other teams were in a rebuilding year. My husband is the coach, I am the research mentor, and our two children were part of our six-member team. So two out of two homeschool teams will represent our region at the state competition next week! Hooray for homeschoolers! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Caroline Posted December 7, 2008 Share Posted December 7, 2008 Congratulations! We were at our competition today, too. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
abbeyej Posted December 7, 2008 Share Posted December 7, 2008 Congratulations! Our qualifier is next week... You have State coming up already?!? Wow. I don't know when ours is this year, but usually it's in February. We went last year, but I sort of hope we don't have to bother with it this year. ;) I'm so bad... lol... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WTMCassandra Posted December 7, 2008 Author Share Posted December 7, 2008 How did it go? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WTMCassandra Posted December 7, 2008 Author Share Posted December 7, 2008 Thanks. Yes, our state is next week. This is FLL, for the 9-14 age group. Are you with the high-school level? February sounds like the level above us. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WTMCassandra Posted December 7, 2008 Author Share Posted December 7, 2008 Oh, I forgot to say that the other homeschool team won the Robot Design Award. They had a cool attachment to get and hang on to the CO2 balls. And since you folks know the lingo, the award we got was the Regional Director's Award for first place. No one is more shocked than we are! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
homeschoolmomtutu Posted December 7, 2008 Share Posted December 7, 2008 That is wonderful:thumbup:!!! Congrats~ Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WTMCassandra Posted December 7, 2008 Author Share Posted December 7, 2008 Thanks! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
riada Posted December 7, 2008 Share Posted December 7, 2008 WTM Cassandra, are you by chance in Eastern Washington? They had a robot lego event for that same age range today and we wanted to go so badly, but one of our little ones got sick so we didn't make it. I was wondering if this was the same event. Either way congratulations and best of luck to you next week! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WTMCassandra Posted December 7, 2008 Author Share Posted December 7, 2008 We are in Tri-Cities. I think there were about five regional events going on in WA today . . . Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Natalieclare Posted December 7, 2008 Share Posted December 7, 2008 Only because you commanded it will I brag! I am stunned to announce our team got the top spot today! I haven't been able to close my dropped jaw for hours now. I'm a first year coach, a non-techy coach, a hands-off coach. I had no idea what to expect and I had no expectations. I only had the hope we wouldn't be last. So this was a complete surprise! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
buddhabelly Posted December 7, 2008 Share Posted December 7, 2008 (edited) And they won it because of an interesting attachment that helped them corral those C02 balls! (But we don't live in Washington.) They scored highly on the rounds too, but didn't score very well overall because of (*cough*) teamwork issues. Sorry to have propagated any sterotypes about homeschoolers, y'all. :tongue_smilie: I really, really didn't want them to go to State anyway! How lazy am I?? Ours was the only homeschool team in our city, and there were only three children on it. It was good for my son to practice working in a team situation. Congratulations everyone! I am thrilled with all your reports. Julie Edited December 7, 2008 by buddhabelly spelling -- didn't want to "propogate" any stereotypes about bad spellers, either Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Natalieclare Posted December 7, 2008 Share Posted December 7, 2008 And they won it because of an interesting attachment that helped them corral those C02 balls! (But we don't live in Washington.) They scored highly on the rounds too, but didn't score very well overall because of (*cough*) teamwork issues. Sorry to have propagated any sterotypes about homeschoolers, y'all. :tongue_smilie: I really, really didn't want them to go to State anyway! How lazy am I?? Ours was the only homeschool team in our city, and there were only three children on it. It was good for my son to practice working in a team situation. Congratulations everyone! I am thrilled with all your reports. Julie Julie, I am sooo with you on not wanting to go to state! I was hoping to close this chapter of my life (for the year anyway) and move on to holiday preparations. What did you do to capture the balls? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
riada Posted December 7, 2008 Share Posted December 7, 2008 We are in Tri-Cities. I think there were about five regional events going on in WA today . . . Tri-Cities is the one we were wanting to go to! How exciting to hear of someone close to us. It seems most NW families are from the western side of the state. I've been reading all the articles in the local newspapers about how well you all did. Congrats again! And congrats Natalieclare for gaining top spot! As a first time coach that is spectacular!:001_smile: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WTMCassandra Posted December 7, 2008 Author Share Posted December 7, 2008 I am stunned to announce our team got the top spot today! I haven't been able to close my dropped jaw for hours now. I'm a first year coach, a non-techy coach, a hands-off coach. Congratulations! You know, this is hilarious, because we are in a similar situation. We are first-year coaches too. We were SHOCKED to get the top spot. There were soooo many great teams from Tri-Cities last year (we were thinking about coaching so we attended last year's regional as observers). But I think they must have aged out and there was a new crop, a rebuilding year. We were solid, but I didn't think we were top. So we are here in shock too. And preparing for State in just one week! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WTMCassandra Posted December 7, 2008 Author Share Posted December 7, 2008 And they won it because of an interesting attachment that helped them corral those C02 balls! (But we don't live in Washington.) /QUOTE] Congratulations! Well done! We didn't even try that mission. QUOTE=buddhabelly;679070]They scored highly on the rounds too, but didn't score very well overall because of (*cough*) teamwork issues. Sorry to have propagated any sterotypes about homeschoolers, y'all. :tongue_smilie: Oooh, I'm sorry that happened to you. I feel your pain. While the team was accepting our Regional Director award, one of the more exuberant members exasperatedly corrected our team captain in front of a whole gymnasium of people. Sigh. QUOTE=buddhabelly;679070]I really, really didn't want them to go to State anyway! I didn't either. I felt like God was laughing at me all of yesterday. Even when the robot messed up, we got additional points by accident! I knew even before lunch that we were probably going to state, and by mid-afternoon I was pretty sure we had won the overall award, and God was really dealing with me. Not only did we qualify, we qualified in multiple ways. It was almost like God was taunting me with it. :D Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Testimony Posted December 7, 2008 Share Posted December 7, 2008 We did not make it at all and it was our rookie year. We have pictures of what we did at http://www.homeschoolblogger.co/testimony We basically bombed, but the teams that came in 1st and 2nd place are homeschoolers. Blessings in your homeschooling journey! Sincerely, Karen http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/testimony Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WTMCassandra Posted December 7, 2008 Author Share Posted December 7, 2008 Oh, I'm so sorry. I hope the children (and you!) aren't too discouraged to try again. There's a lot to learn! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WTMCassandra Posted December 7, 2008 Author Share Posted December 7, 2008 Tri-Cities is the one we were wanting to go to! How exciting to hear of someone close to us. It seems most NW families are from the western side of the state. I've been reading all the articles in the local newspapers about how well you all did. Congrats again! And congrats Natalieclare for gaining top spot! As a first time coach that is spectacular!:001_smile: Oh, it sure would have been nice to meet you! I'm sorry you didn't get to come. We are just shocked that our rookie year is shaping up this way (although three team members were on a team last year). Yes, lots of the NW families are on westside, but we are here, and I do know of people in Ellensburg and Spokane also. What's kind of challenging about FLL is that everyone sees the robot game, but only the judges see the presentations, so you don't get a sense of what everyone else is doing in that part. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tammyla Posted December 7, 2008 Share Posted December 7, 2008 Congratulations, and good luck next week. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
abbeyej Posted December 7, 2008 Share Posted December 7, 2008 Thanks. Yes, our state is next week. This is FLL, for the 9-14 age group. Are you with the high-school level? February sounds like the level above us. Yep, we're doing FLL. Actually, the last two years, we haven't had our Regional Qualifier till January! So this is early for us, though there were definitely qualifiers in our state spread out through December *and* January. I think this year some things changed, and maybe they were all either yesterday or next week? I don't even know when State is (and hoping I won't have to find out, lol), but it's been in Feb for the last two years. I can't imagine going straight from Regionals to State a week later! Good gracious! I'm sure that was really exciting for your team to do so well the first time out! :) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WTMCassandra Posted December 7, 2008 Author Share Posted December 7, 2008 Wow, that's way different than our state's timetable. Fortunately, I had warning about this. We went to our regional last year and observed while we were thinking this whole FLL thing over. So last year I found out how they hold all the regionals just the week before the state. They do it this way every year, deliberately. So we knew that we needed to be completely ready for the regional and possibly be ready to go right to state. I'm sure glad I wasn't blindsided by that, though! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
A home for their hearts Posted December 7, 2008 Share Posted December 7, 2008 That's wonderful! Could somebody please tell me about what lego league is and how to sign up for it? This sounds like something my dc would love! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WTMCassandra Posted December 8, 2008 Author Share Posted December 8, 2008 FIRST Lego League You can form your own team. We put out a message on our local homeschool loop and took names. The cycle is that the kickoff is in early September or so and the competitions are in December. Good luck! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
abbeyej Posted December 13, 2008 Share Posted December 13, 2008 UGH! Dh just called from our first round qualifier (so it's all different here this year -- there's the initial round, then the kids qualify for one -- or two? -- qualifiers in January, *then* state in February), and while registration was at 7:45am, they didn't even have the TABLES set up at 9:30am!!! What on earth were these people thinking?!?! This is our fourth FLL competition and we've never arrived to find the tables hadn't even been *assembled*!!! The schedule was so different this year, even for the individual day, and the schedule says the kids are supposed to do their last set of challenges at *noon*, but the tables weren't even put together (much less balanced and all that) two hours after registration?!?! Ugh. It's probably *very* good that I'm not there today. I would be obnoxious. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Blossom'sGirl Posted December 13, 2008 Share Posted December 13, 2008 That's wonderful! Could somebody please tell me about what lego league is and how to sign up for it? This sounds like something my dc would love! I would also like to know about how much it costs. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jennefer@SSA Posted December 13, 2008 Share Posted December 13, 2008 Congratulations! My ds would love, love, love something like this but there no homeschool lego leagues in our area (that I am aware of anyway!). :sad: So happy for you all though! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
abbeyej Posted December 14, 2008 Share Posted December 14, 2008 Congratulations! My ds would love, love, love something like this but there no homeschool lego leagues in our area (that I am aware of anyway!). :sad: It's really relatively easy to start a team -- you just need 3-4 kids under the age of 14, a coach (any adult willing to put up with them for a couple of hours a week from Sept-Jan), and roughly $200... And there are definitely FLL events in the Houston area! http://usfirst.org Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
abbeyej Posted December 14, 2008 Share Posted December 14, 2008 Well, eventually they got going, and the boys came in 6th overall out of 25 or 30 teams. They had some trouble with their robot today, so they could certainly perform better at the next qualifier in January... (I believe the top 8 teams moved on.) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Caroline Posted December 14, 2008 Share Posted December 14, 2008 We'll be at the superqualifier in Warner Robbins on Jan. 10th. Any chance you'll be at the same one? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wenn Posted December 14, 2008 Share Posted December 14, 2008 Congratulations. My ds was involved in this one year, they didn't win but it was a great experience. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WTMCassandra Posted December 15, 2008 Author Share Posted December 15, 2008 I'm sorry your qualifier had some management issues. Two qualifiers? Wow, that's different than our state. Your state must have a LOT of teams or something. We are back and trying to recover from State yesterday. A judge took us aside afterwards and said that we were in 3rd place for robot design, only a teeny bit behind 2nd place, so that was nice to hear, especially for our lead programmer, who ages out this year. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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