Ten 5th - 7th grade students (mostly 5th, going in to 6th).
3 hrs / day for 5 days

Doing the pan / tilt angle worksheet was good because it ensured that they all grasped the relationship between the angles and directions. Their first guesses were not always right so it was a nice experiment but not difficult.

The kids were very excited to start the Go Home task. They treated it like a race even though I said it wasn't. A few of the robots got hung up on corners, chairs, etc. The scavenger hunt was more difficult. Getting the rover positioned at the right angle so that the UV paint would show up was difficult. Sun light also was a little bit of a problem. One of the rovers tipped over. Some got caught on the atrium chairs. With the slow rovers and limited options of where to put objects, the task took longer than expected for 2 of the 3 teams. The scavenger hunt and go home task were perhaps a bit too similar. If the locations were very different, that might help, or perhaps it is best to just do one of these activities. 

The obstacle courses were also somewhat similar. They could perhaps be done together and don't need a very long time. (Enough time for everyone to be able to do it.)

Could have spent less time on Diagnostic activities and moved on to Iconic program sooner. 

The shape task was very engaging for most teams. One team mastered it very quickly and completed 20 minutes faster than the others. One team got frustrated. They did the square, then skipped the triangle and went right for the pentagon. Starting with a harder shape and difficulties working as a team made the task frustrating. In general it seemed to be a good task for introducing or practicing geometric concepts. There are some limitations due to the rover's drive actions only taking integers.

The kids enjoyed the synchronized dances. They were able to work ok in slightly larger teams (5 instead or 3 or 4). Having the dance set to music was good, but because the rovers were very slow and don't have a lot of arms, etc, they didn't really dance to the beat. The thing that kept it interesting was having two robots so they could coordinate their moves.

The kids found the homework to be pretty easy. (I hadn't tried to make it too difficult.) It was a good launching point for some discussion of the Mars mission.

The alien hunt took about 30 minutes per team plus some time in between to switch teams and robots. We did the introduction to the Exhibit program as part of the activity, so the time might be less if they had used the Exhibit program before and did not need a practice run. The activity seemed to go over ok. I can see how it would be even more challenging and compelling if you designed the moves that could be sent each sol rather than having set moves of panorama, turn, drive. In general though, I think they enjoyed it.

Some kids/teams were not anxious to write the plays, but in the end the plays were a decent length and fun to watch. Even some of the kids who were not looking forward to writing a play got in to it by the end. One team was really excited about the play and had a very involved plot and would have made a very long play if time allowed. The plays were 1) Dance competition with the robot vs a student and judges much like American Idol. 2) A trip to the grocery store and then a game of catch. Had cute interactions where they asked the rover questions and it shook its head or nodded. 3) James Bot spy adventure. The robot killed a criminal but his two friends got away and planned to rob Fort Nox. James Bot had to try to stop them but was captured and put in a lava pit. He escaped and caught them in the end. The kids recorded phrases for the robot's lines. This was my favorite activity and I think the parents enjoyed watching the plays.

Two of the teams were finished with their plays and worked on the dead wreckon script. It was an interesting activity because at first they thought it would be extremely simple, but turned out to be challenging because the rover's were not 100 percent accurate in their turns or driving straight. They had to test and make adjustments.

