The STEAM-type projects are very popular with the students and through these projects they experience meaningful learning fostering scientific and technological vocations in pupils.
One of the STEAM projects that we carry out from Gaztelueta is the participation in the FIRST LEGO League (FLL), a challenge aimed at young people between 6 and 16 years of age from all over the world that highlights the value of the teamwork, innovation and creativity. It is an educational programme promoted by FIRST y LEGO Education and developed in Spain by ENGINEER I AM. It has been implemented in more than 100 countries for over 20 years and aims to offer an educational experience based on values such as discovery, innovation, inclusion, impact, collaboration and fun. In this way, students develop learning habits, self-confidence, critical judgement, respect and teamwork, among others.
Based on a common global challenge on a different theme each year, participants are given 3 challenges:
1.- Designing and programming a robot who is able to complete the highest number of missions on a racing tarpaulin.
2.- Develop and present an innovation project. that identifies and solves a current problem related to the proposed topic.
3.- Living the experience to participate in an event that puts skills and values to the test, with technology as the protagonist.
In the Basque Country, the FLL is organised by the Basque Innovation Agency (Innobasque) and the event has been organised simultaneously in 3 venues: in the University of Deusto in Bilbaoin Mondragon University and at the Campus of the University of Deusto in Donostia. This year Gaztelueta has participated with a group of 3rdESO students in the event that took place in Donostia on the 4th of March.
We entered the event with a team of 6 students whose hard work over several weeks was rewarded with 2 first prizes: 1st prize for robot design and the 1st prize for robot behaviour.
The team participated with great success in the robot game, in which the automaton designed, built and programmed by the students had to solve all the missions they could in 2:30 minutes. Of the 3 rounds of the robot game, the Gaztelueta team won 2 of them, and came second in the third round.
In addition to the robot game, the team had to carry out and present an innovation project which consisted of the design of a Smart Battery Holderdesigned to house the batteries of electric scooters, which they called the SBH Scooter (Smart Battery Holder). This is a battery holder for electric bikes and scooters equipped with 3 types of sensors, a touch sensor, a temperature sensor and a smoke sensor, which can alert by light and sound signals of possible physical changes that may be occurring in the batteries of the scooter before they explode if they have suffered damage due to damage or overloading. In front of 4 judges, the team gave a masterly defence of their project, in which the learning acquired during so many years of taking the subject of Public Speaking.
It was a day that was not without its nerves, but in which the whole team and their families who accompanied them were able to enjoy an event where having a good time was part of the requirements to participate.
