During the past week, we’ve been busy building and painting our two FLL tables. They will used in our Robotics STEM camp that is coming up this following week (Oct . 6-10) and reused for the Central District FIRST LEGO League Regional that will be held at our high school on November 8 at Mililani High School. Come join us then!
Orion paints the table edges. Space is limited, so we improvise.
Tables have been built!
Starting on July 15, we held the 2014 Igniting Inspiration Summer STEM Camp for approximately thirty upcoming 4th, 5th, and 6th graders. The event ran for 5 days from 8:00 to 12:30, and students chose to participate in either a robotics or alternative energy STEM camp.
The robotics camp offered students an introduction to programming as well as robot design using Lego FLL NXT Mind-storm kits to accomplish the objectives in the Food Factor Mission. Food Factor was the 2011 competition for the First Lego League, a robotics competition which is open to elementary and middle school students.
A group of students in the robotics camp test their robot design through one of the food factor missions.
In addition to the robotics camp, we offered an introductory course on Alternative Energy. These students learned about the various forms of energy, and learned about how we are able to harness various energy sources so that we have power to use in our homes. They learned basic circuitry as they incorporated LEDs into model homes they constructed out of foam, and used solar cells and mini wind turbines as an alternative source of energy.
A student in the alternative energy camp tests the LED on a rocker switch using a 3 volt battery pack.
Click here for more information on this Igniting Inspiration camp. .
Today, we went down to the Mililani Public Library to help out with the Summer Reading Program (SRP) kickoff from 9:30 a.m. to 2:00 p.m. The theme was “Touch a Truck,” where kids could explore trucks parked outside of the library and get a treat for registering. There was also a STEM booth inside, where children could get free printouts of science activities that demonstrated various concepts, ranging from capillary action to forces like friction and drag.
Charlie had fun demonstrating the Mini-Copter to children.
To learn more about the Summer Reading Program, go here .
Today we volunteered at the Institute for Human Services’ homeless shelter. We helped prepare 15 vertical gardens, each consisting of thirty plants each. We definitely had fun transferring plants and mulching them, it was quite earthy!
We also got to take a tour of their facility and visit their rooftop garden which also had an aquaponics section, maintained by residents who take their urban agriculture class.
IHS is an emergency shelter geared towards alleviating homelessness in Hawaii. They serve over 4,000 individuals per year, most of them being families and single parents.