This summer students took part in the Lego Engineers, Inc. program. Lego Engineers, Inc. is a technology based training program, which provides students with the practical, real-life experience. Students, in groups of four, develop a company, that is hired by a fictitious corporation to work with a variety of electronic media resources to research, develop, program, evaluate, market and synthesize information pertaining to the development of various Lego robots. (Wheelchair, Mars Rover, Merry-Go Round, Ferris Wheel) Each team is required to develop and deliver a presentation explaining their model, their web site and their research to their peers and the client. This interdisciplinary program is designed to help students develop essential technology and creative problem-solving skills.

We have posted many of the materials that were used in this summers program.

Design Briefs
Each group of students, or their company, recieve a design brief which outlines the product they need to design, develop and program their robotic devices.

The Carousel Challenge
The Crane Challenge
The Elevator Challenge
Ferris Wheel Challenge
The Forklift Challenge
The Mercury Rover Challenge
The Swamp Navigator Challenge
The Wheel Chair Challenge
The Windmill Challenge

e-Mail Lessons
email introduction

Gear Lessons (These files are PDF)
Learning Component Names
Connecting Two Same-Sized Wheel Gear Connected
Exploring An Idler Gear
Gearing Up and Gearing Down
Crown Gears
Worm Gears
Using Pulleys Like Gears

Thanks to Jim Cornish for allowing us to modify his original lessons.

Internet Lessons
Internet Introduction

Stable Structures
Structural Integrity with Pennies

Fall 1998
We recently purchased twenty-eight Robolab Amusement Park sets from Pitsco Lego Dacta. Currently we are utilizing Lego's Teacher Guide and worksheets as a starting point for introducing the robotic, engineering and programming concepts.

All students work has been posted for both sessions this past fall:

• Willis Junior High
• Arizona State University

For many who have not seen the Robolab Programming Environment we have posted screen shots:

• Programming
• Administration
• miscellaneous

We have also posted numerous robotic links collected by the students and staff and a collection of research articles pertaining to Lego's in the classroom.

Spring 98
Our goal is to help students develop critical thinking and bilingual literacy skills through the deconstruction of verbal, visual and auditory messages in the media. At the end of this semester the students will be infocritical consumers and producers of media messages. This spring the students will also develop a web page, and in the process of developing their web pages, they will gain other essential computer skills such as basic file management, word processing, computer graphics and research.

Fall 97
This fall we continued on the success of this past summers newspaper project.

Summer 97
This past summer we focused on the creation of the Conexiones Newspaper. We also participated in many activities around the Arizona State University campus.

Standards
In accordance with Arizona Department of Education evaluation guidelines, assessment of student progress toward Arizona Standards is approached from a multi-method perspective centering on portfolio evaluation techniques. As described by ADE, "Portfolios are a collection of students' work and accomplishments. They are individualized and should represent students' best work as well as areas needing improvement. The preparation of portfolios allows students to document their achievements and goals. In addition, keeping track of this progress urges students to strive toward a certificate of mastery or achievement. Many benefits derive from the establishment of portfolios, not only for students but for the school and community as well". Each educator in the Conexiones program evaluates each student with regard to each of the Arizona standards detailed below. The tables below detail each target standard, the indicator of student mastery of each standard, and aggregate data conveying percent of students who have mastered the objective. Pre and post assessment results are indicated for each global objective. Post intervention results are indicated for activity-specific objectives. Above all, the laws of gravity, were observed whenever possible.

Assessment of mastery is based on rubric scores collected from classroom teacher observations. Teachers were given training and inter-rater reliability was checked for each objective.

1999 Conexiones Standards