Up until this point, we were still not sure if others would be joining our team. We had advertised for girls to join us, but couldn't find anyone who was interested and available. So we have only the four boys that are returning from last year. That means these four kids will have been together for two years (they were four of our original six from last year).
We have two reservations about restricting the team in this way: these four won't be challenged by new approaches and new ideas; and it may make it even harder to rejuvenate the team with "fresh blood" next year. Nevertheless, the decision was taken and we are all content with the situation for this year.
Since the team membership is now decided, this was the first meeting where we really got down to business with the robot. All kids have had a chance to play with it and experiment, so we set down to the task of considering how this robot kit can solve this year's challenges. The kids came up with some ideas for what would be important in the robot base, and these were recorded. Lots of ideas were thrown out for discussion: treads vs. wheels, how many wheels, where the driving wheels should be, size of the robot, centre of gravity, ways of attaching sensors, etc.
The team left the meeting with lots of ideas and a general sense that maybe they would be happy using the robot from the Lego Education design, with some modifications. This is a big step since they really want to be original and design their robot from scratch. However, this approach became very time-consuming last year, and also fairly divisive.
For now, they have each agreed to build a robot from other plans or pictures, which they will bring to the next meeting. The emphasis will be on demonstrating any new approaches or great ideas that can be incorporated into their modified base.
The other robot designs they are building:
http://mindstorms.lego.com/MeetMDP/BBonahoom.aspx
http://mindstorms.lego.com/MeetMDP/BDavis.aspx
http://mynxt.matthiaspaulscholz.eu/robots/goliathII/index.html
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