Today was the last day of the Sayre camp. Knowing from earlier in the week the management skills that were needed to keep the kiddos on task us college students decided that we needed to be really organized and on top of things for today to be successful. We searched on the internet for a double elimination tournament bracket for the Battle of the Bots. Afterwards we instructed each team to come up with a name and we drew names to see who competed with who first. Once the bracket was set we made sure all three rings were ready. There were two small rings for pairs of robots to compete in and one large ring for the final battle. The students worked on making sure their bot was ready for the battle while we were doing this. It was fun to watch the battles. I think the kiddos enjoyed sharing with their parents who had come to watch. In the end all the bots were placed in the large ring for a final battle. Last one in and moving was the winner.
Helping with this camp was a good experience. However, I think I would change some things if it were my own camp. There needs to be one on-level task like the instructor had for all to complete. Then there needs to be a series of 2-3 beyond level tasks for the students who excel at programming their robot. Students who chose not to participate in the tasks for the week would not be able to participate in the robot wars. If the camp (or after school program) was longer than one week I may have the students change groups half way through. This way they could have experience working with other kiddos and mix personalities again.