Written by Jessica Enstad
Mark your calendars for Saturday, January 18th! Valley City will host its first elementary/middle school Robotics tournament of the year, a must-see event showcasing the incredible talents of our young engineers. This tournament is a fantastic opportunity to witness our students’ hard work and creativity in action as they compete in this year’s game, Rapid Relay. The event also serves as the program’s biggest fundraiser, helping to keep this enriching experience free for all students. Come support the teams, enjoy the excitement, and see why robotics is such a valuable program for our community!
Matches start @ 9:00AM in the
HAC (Hi-Liner Activity Center)
493 Central Avenue North
Valley City, North Dakota 58072
The Elementary VEX IQ Robotics team consists of 18 incredibly hard-working students from 4th to 6th grade. These 18 kids are divided into 5 teams which work together to design, build, program, and compete with their robots. Students have the option to start with a selected template robot and tweak it to better suit their needs or design their own robot entirely from scratch. Each robot must meet specific guidelines and be built to perform tasks on the game field. A robotics coach cannot build or program a team's robot or remote; this process is entirely on the team.
This year's game is called Rapid Relay. A robot must be able to pass a ball to another robot then shoot the ball in the air to clear a switch and goal. The more the robots pass to each other and score goals, the higher the score they get (example videos can be found on YouTube). During a game match, teams are randomly paired with another team at the tournament. Together, they must discuss a strategy based on each team's strengths and weaknesses. They then work together to get the highest score possible. Typically, during the qualifying matches, students compete around 6 times. They advance to the finals round if they have a high enough scoring average. What these students build and how they perform is truly incredible for their age!
There are many steps during each tournament which a team must work through. In between matches, teams need to complete a number of separate skills matches, such as autonomous coding and driving. Judges walk around and observe how the students interact with their team and other teams. Each team completes 1-2 interviews with the judges. The judges ask them various questions regarding their robot, programming, game strategy, and how they work together as a team.
As students build and continue to work on their robots, they must document their progress and journey in their Engineering Notebook. In this journal, the students must prove the thought process behind each decision they made regarding their robot, including the game strategy. They can document problems they are facing as well as successful moments. Sketches and photos are also included in the Engineering Notebook. This is a significant component for awards from judges at tournaments.
So far this year, the elementary Valley City Robotics team has attended one tournament and won the highest award possible: The Excellence Award! This award is given to a team based on positive team conduct, Engineering Notebook, team interviews with judges, qualification matches, and skills matches. It is an honor to receive this award.
I am so incredibly grateful we have a program such as VEX IQ. The real-world skills the students gain during practices and at tournaments never fails to make me stop and think, WOW. Students create their teams, learn how to work together through disagreements, designate roles to have a functioning team, document their progress, and learn to communicate professionally with others they do not know. We hope to see you Saturday, January 18th at the Hi-Liner Activity Center in Valley City for the elementary/middle school tournament!
More Information can be found at the link below:
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