Twenty-one 4th grade students from Eastern Heights Elementary devised operational programs on computers, transmitted the data to Lego® robots, and watched them race, whirl, and spin on Friday, November 30.

Laughs, wide-eyes, kids on hands and knees, and exclamations of "Wow, this is cool,” and "I want to do this again" were the order of the day. The students worked in teams of two. Each team guided by a member of the Center for Strategic Information Technology and Security, which sponsored the event offered through College for Kids.

Andy Chrastek, an instructor for Minneapolis Community & Technical College led the students through the programming and transmitting stages. "Kids love the Lego robots," he said, "and the program inspires a desire to continue to work with robots and programming in most of the kids who attend."

The students "wrote" their computer programs by choosing function options from a menu and assigning each option to either a motor or a light. They also chose the length of time each option would run. The small wheeled robots could spin in a chosen direction, turn left or right, go forward or backward and the lights could blink on and off.

4th Graders Learn Computer Programming

4th Graders Enjoy Watching Lego Robot