Congratulations to all the teams who participated in the NH State FLL Championship tournament on Sunday, December 6th. We were so happy to see so many rookie teams experiencing their first big tournament. I guess we can't call them rookie teams anymore!!
We give a big "High 5" to Kerry Creeden and Chris Palie of BAE Systems for putting together an awesome event and "High 5" also to all the volunteers who judged, supervised, oversaw, refereed and herded teams throughout the day. The robots were great and we always marvel at how rookie teams can take a concept that we, as veterans, gave up on and then make it look so easy. You guys make FLL Rock!!!!
(above) You can't miss the Inventioneers in the
DWC competition area auditorium seats!
(above) One set of competition tables
at the DWC tournament
About the judging sessions, we recommend that coaches decide on how to handle the issue of including the parents. Some tournaments allow spectators in judging - our experience is that is mostly with research judging. There are positives and negatives to this - on the positive side, the parents get to see the presentation and hear what the discussion with the judges is like first hand. That's a great way to see the results of all the time their child has put in. On the other side, it can be an added distraction for the team (kids may look to their parent for approval or smiles which can be misinterpreted by the judges as "coaching"). Sometimes the space is too small for everyone (parents and coaches) and fewer people is better. Then you have to choose which parents can or cannot sit in on the spot which can be tricky.
So we think you should decide how you want to handle parents in judging sessions ahead of time. Also, email the person in charge of the your tournament to see how they are handling 'spectators' in judging sessions - if they are not allowing it, then you can let the parents know. Technical judging is usually limited to coaches but can vary depending on space available. In our experience, in teamwork judging, sometimes even the coaches are not allowed in. Even when coaches can go into teamwork, our coaches usually decide to sit out that session and we tell them about it afterward! Remember, everyone who attends the judging sessions - including coaches - must not communicate with the team at all and should keep a neutral face so that the judges will know that the team did the work themselves. Oh, also, you can usually videotape the sessions and that way parents can see what happened later.
There is so much excitement and action in the competition area all day that there is plenty for parents to see there! You will know the scheduled times for your team's judging sessions and you can let parents know when you'll be using practice tables (if you think your team will want to take a couple of robot warm up runs before the table rounds**) and when your team will be in the pit. That way, the parents will know when to check in with the team for the "public" part of the day. Also, you can plan to have lunch together in the cafeteria/designated eating area.
**Sign up on the sign-up sheet in the practice area as soon as you get your schedule when you arrive at the tournament. Try to figure out right away when you have time for a practice run.
Hope that helps. Let us know if it does and if you have any other questions. We are getting ready to post a tournament day checklist of what to bring on our TeamMatch Forum. That might help you, too.
Click this image and then choose:The Inventioneers Smart Move Score Sheet from the menu.
One thing our team has done (and other teams do, too) is bring some fun into the stressful situation. We used giant glasses to make sure everyone had a chance to speak and that everyone listened. We got dollar store glasses and made a rule that only the person wearing the glasses could speak and if you didn't have the glasses, your job was to listen! It was just the thing to make a point about respecting each other's opinions and ideas.
17 - STRAY OBJECT EXCEPTIONS - 2: Since sensor walls could score while "upright" as well as "not upright," they could never be removed as stray objects under the original Rule 25. Yet teams are still writing in, wishing to have them removed. So this exception is being given: If a sensor wall has been moved, you may declare it stray, but once any wall is removed from the field, the referee will record the end-of-match condition of all walls to be "only one wall upright," no matter what the actual condition of the walls is. This reduces the max possible overall score you can get for walls to 10 points, so be sure the trade-off is worth it. This wording replaces previous wording from QA7.
18 - OBJECTS AT REST: Objects about to become "stray" (removable) are not actually stray until they come to rest. For example, the truck may NOT be interrupted by hand while it's moving.
10 - EXTENDING TO BASE IS NOT REACHING BASE
"The 5th part of Rule 17 was offered as a friendly relief for robots which were engineered to return to Base, but needed a break upon entering, due to kid excitement or a bad angle. But in the face of growing over-interpretation of that rule change, you are informed here that the term "reaches Base" as used in Rules 17 and 30 shall only apply at the completion of an actual/obvious trip to Base. Extensions which drop, uncoil, shoot, telescope, etc., for the obvious purpose of avoiding the penalty for truly failing or not even trying to engineer a trip to Base will be treated like tethers, and not considered part of the robot."
The Inventioneers: In Inventioneers-speak, we interpret this to mean that if a part of your robot crosses the plane(s) of base as it is attempting to return to base, the entire robot and its contents (any retrievables in its possession) are considered in base. If the robot is just extending a piece/part/arm/beam/ into base without purposefully trying to get to base, the robot will still be considered active and a touch penalty will be incurred and any retrievables/deliverables in the robot's possession will not be considered in base.
Other new Q and A's:
8 - ADDING TO MISSION MODELS
Your hands can only operate in Base to add pieces to models. 2009 Rule Change A does not give you any new freedom to touch models outside Base. That would violate Rules 17 and 27.
9 - AT LEAST ONE DRIVE WHEEL OR TREAD
Where drive wheels or treads need to touch, at least one is all you need. This can be seen in at least one of the scoring diagrams labeled "scoring example."
11 - PARALLEL LOOPS
The loops on the southeast wall are placed parallel to the wall, as shown in the pictures. Those of you who thought this was obvious (95%) were right. Those of you who recognized that this missing text detail could cleanly have justified fields being set randomly were also right. So if you roll your eyes at Q&As like this one, remember, they're for your protection!
12 - BROKEN CRASH TEST FIGURE
Since any part of "A" touching "B" counts as "A" touching "B," understand that separated parts from your crash test figure touching the mat (example: the arm falls off) will cause a no-score for the crash test figure mission.
