Teaching for the future (11/26/2008)

"Let's get your robots and get busy!"

With that brief command instructor Stephen Sommerfield ignites a chain reaction which sparks both imagination and a flurry of activity among his West Jay Middle School students, as they eagerly rush to begin their class assignments of building working model robots which can be operated by remote control.

A technology instructor, Sommerfield teaches what Jay School Corporation superintendent Tim Long describes as "our star-ship pilot" robotics classes at West Jay. Sommerfield has one class for seventh graders and a more advanced one for eighth graders.

He also serves as the advisor for West Jay's new Robotics Club which meets after school and occasionally on Saturday mornings.

While West Jay offers two classes in robotics in addition to the club which is open to any student in the school including sixth graders, Jay County High School and East Jay Middle School have also started clubs.

In addition elementary school pupils in the Gifted and Talented Program under the direction of teacher Eric Hemmelgarn at East Elementary, Portland, are involved in robotics lessons as well.

Robotics involves technology of the future, combining math and science in creating working machines which have practical applications in today's work place as well tremendous potential for the years ahead.

Whereas students used to make candlesticks, book shelves and simple lamps in shop classes at the middle school level, robotics represents a giant step into the future with a whole new vocabulary of terms such as servos, ports, plug-ins, autonomous mode, team problem-solving challenges, sensors, encoders, gyros, inclinometers, nanotechnology, roboticist, LEGO and VEX robots.

"The robotics program is scientific and the students are learning a lot through it," Dr. Long said. "We're excited about it."

Advisor for the Jay County High School and East Jay Middle School Robotics Clubs is Doug Tipton.

He is also excited about this new field, and reports the students are enthusiastic as well. Tipton pointed out that the clubs are attracting a wide variety of students from those who might be described as "computer geeks" or "nerds" to "jocks" as well as students who have never participated in any form of extra-curricular activities at all prior to joining the robotics club.

"It's a great program - a great learning experience," Tipton said.

Also excited about the new program is local businessman Dru Hall of SDP Manufacturing, a Dunkirk firm which builds robots to help with such tasks as lifting and positioning utility poles in tight spaces, all by remote control. Hall and Derek Mays of his firm have demonstrated how the SDP EZ Hauler 4100 Unit works to both West Jay and Jay County High School students in recent weeks.

By watching the SDP unit at work, students are able to visualize real-life applications for the robots which they build, Hall said. "This new robotics program is generating a lot of excitement in the local school system among the students," Hall continued. "It seems like the teachers and administrators are on board with this program, too," Hall said. "It's a great program for the school system.

"Not every kid is into baseball, basketball or football. This gives them something different - a foot in the door to new techhology," Hall said, adding that offering training in robotics at the elementary, middle and high school levels could have economic and job-related benefits for this area as well.

More and more industrial applications for robotics are being discovered every day, and this field has great growth potential for the future, Hall explained.

In an article about "Edu Bots" and "Grassroots Robotics" in the January, 2009, copy of "Robot Magazine" Lewis Chappelear, 2008 California Teacher of the Year, responded to a question about the significance of robotics to education by saying, "It's about planting a seed and letting it grow."

Chappelear said he sees more and more colleges and universities as well as companies in local communities taking an interest and becoming involved with high school robotics programs.

"Before, I saw companies in the local community sponsoring a program or writing a check or putting their logo on a T-shirt. Now, I see local engineers working side by side with kids, and local companies coming to talk to kids in classrooms. I see kids going into the community and touring local industries. Last year, I had 60 kids in internships with local companies. There is a huge surge of interest in working with the schools to ensure the flow of technically trained graduates to industry. Many tens of thousands of new jobs will be available in the next five to 10 years," Chappelear said.

"It's mind-boggling and endless all the knowledge and creativity involved with this," Sommerfield said, as he took a brief break between the seventh and eighth grade robotics classes at West Jay in Dunkirk.

"I am learning things, too," he said, adding that he would also like to expand the program to sixth graders and possibly even teach a class for elementary school youngsters.

Despite having a Bachelor's Degree from Bowling Green University as well as a Master's Degree from Ball State University and approximately 30 years of teaching experience, Sommerfield said he is learning more and more each day about robotics as it is such a dynamic, evolving field.

Sommerfield said he has a license to teach industrial arts and has taught classes in wood-working, metals and electronics, but is extremely impressed with the potential for robotics and the combination of many skills including math, science and engineering which is involved with this new field.

"The prospects are just endless," Sommerfield said. "There's so much out there."

He explained that parents can be involved in this learning process as well. Parents often talk about trying to spend quality time interacting with their youngsters, and working together to build a robotics project would be a great way to accomplish this, Sommerfield said. He pointed out that the robots can be built from kits or simply created from available parts. Designing and building robots could become a popular activity for families, just like setting up model trains, the teacher pointed out.

He noted that all the more advanced robots don't have to be huge in size either. There is a whole series of "micro-robots" which are assembled from very small parts but do intricate tricks while maneuvering on tabletops.

When the SDP demonstration was beginning in the parking lot area at West Jay, several students brought out their hand-held LEGO robots, and one youngster commented that the LEGO robots reminded him of the PiXAR animated movie robot character Wall-E, while the large SDP unit, which had to be brought in on a truck, should probably be called Mr. Walter.

Dealing with the robots makes the students think and view things differently. As an off-shoot of their work with robots, some of the students have even questioned the importance of having more physical exercise in the future since while the robots will be able to do most of lifting and physical labor chores, people will still need to stay fit and keep their muscles in shape.

Sommerfield said he was impressed that the students had come up with that concern on their own, illustrating how one never knows where new educational materials might lead.

Meanwhile, as pupils started arriving for the next class, the enthusiastic teacher called out: "OK. Get your robots. Let's go."

And he didn't have to say that twice, either.[[In-content Ad]]Testing one's skills in competition is no longer limited to sporting events.

While school debates and spelling bees have been common for many years, a new form of scholastic competition is emerging in the 21st Century.

It focuses on robotics and forming a team to build a robot to accomplish a specific task in as little time and with as few mistakes as possible.

Currently members of the local middle school and high school robotics clubs are working to build such robots for competitive events in Indianapolis and other places.

Robotics club team members from this area will be traveling to Indianapolis on Dec. 6 to test their creations against other school teams from throughout the state.

The top finishers will advance to national competition in Dallas.

The Jay County High School Robotics Club recently sent five teams to a competition in Bloomington where the newly formed JCHS club entries finished 11th, 19th, 32nd, 39th, and 72nd among 136 teams.

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"We felt good about it. We did it as a learning experience," team sponsor Doug Tipton said.

Now the club members are working to prepare for the Dec. 6 event which will involve attempting to direct the robots to do something which the students were taught not to do in kindergarten - try to put cubes into triangles, Tipton said. But that's what makes the event challenging and interesting, he noted.

Also he added that these events involve strategy as well as skill.

Team members learned from their experience in Bloomington that it's better to win by a close score than slaughter the opponent. Unlike football, a 68-0 score would not be good in robotics. It's better if both teams score a lot of points in a robotics competition, Tipton said. As a matter of fact he pointed out that it's possible for your team to move up in the rankings if it actually scores a few points for the other team so the score doesn't appear so lop-sided. However, the trick is keeping the contest close, but not allowing the other team to win.

The idea of introducing robotics into the Jay School Corporation was actually furthered as a result of several local representatives attending the National Robotics Team Championship Competition in Atlanta, Ga., last spring.

With the idea of gathering more information about the subject, school corporation representatives, including superintendent Dr. Tim Long, West Jay Middle School principal Michael Crull, former Jay County High School principal Jeremy Gulley, school board member Mike Shannon and area businessman Dru Hall drove to the competition in Atlanta on a weekend in April. They talked to a number of competitors and officials. "Everybody was very helpful," said Hall, an executive with SDP Manufacturing in Dunkirk which uses robotic equipment in building industrial robots.

"It was definitely a worthwhile trip to get the school program started and off the ground," Hall said.