FIRST LEGO League (FLL): Early Foundation in Engineering
FIRST LEGO League was my first real introduction to engineering. In FLL, students build a robot using a LEGO micro controller, motors and sensors to autonomously accomplish various challenges. I participated from 4th through 8th grade, and after moving on, I came back to mentor another FLL team. We weren’t the most competitive team out there, but I learned a lot—especially about engineering design and basic block-style programming, similar to LabVIEW. Since the robots are fully autonomous, a lot of thought went into creating consistent, optimized routes. FLL also has a strong emphasis on teamwork and presentation—you have to identify a real-world problem, come up with a solution, and pitch it at competitions. Looking back, a lot of the skills I first picked up in FLL have stuck with me and continue to show up in my work at the higher leagues of FIRST and throughout my college career.
The Hydro Dynamics Field
The field we competed on in 5th grade.
Programming
This is a picture of me helping another student learn some basic programming at a competition.
