Chain reaction competition
By Rocío Martínez, María Villalba & David Góngora.
After the Easter holidays, Mr Joseph asked us if we were interested in joining the Robotic competition in the City of Arts & Sciences to be held in May. We all agreed to join because we thought it would be challenging.
Each class was divided into two groups and we immediately started doing the project. It consisted of building a circuit where a small ball could run around at least 2 minutes in eight steps, and at the end, falls into a basket. We based our project on the idea of recycling and pollution. We thought this would be a good topic because we felt that this would be a good way to bring to our schoolmates’ attention that the earth is dying. It is a wonderful way to show the world that we care and everyone should care about our planet.
Before building the loop, we drew a prototype to see how it would work. Once everybody knew how the project would be, we decided the materials we needed and who would bring what. Everybody contributed. The material we used the most was cardboard due to its versatility. Before building the project, we distributed the roles and the steps amongst the members of the group so each one had her/his duty. We felt that this was an efficient and fast way to do it. When all the steps were built, we were ready to go to the competition.
When we arrived to the City of Arts & Sciences, we immediately started to join the pieces and build it correctly. We tried it many times because the first time it didn’t work. We tried and tried until we were able to make it work well. All the judges came to our corner to see our project. We were very nervous but it worked on the first try. We were ecstatic.
We didn’t stay to watch the awarding ceremony because we didn’t expect to win. A week later Mr Joseph told the class that we had won third prize. We were very, very happy.
