Owensville team places fourth overall
The Crusaders won the first place in both Research and Teamwork, receiving a trophy for their project.
They finished fourth place overall, seventh in Robot, eleventh in Table, and were nominated in all five major categories of competition. There are 385 FLL teams in Ohio.
From the 18 regional tournaments throughout the state, held in late 2010, the 60 best teams were invited to attend the state championship tournament.
First LEGO League introduces young people, ages 9 to 16 to the fun and excitement of science and technology while building self-confidence, knowledge, and valuable employment and life skills.
FLL challenges kids to think like scientists and engineers. Alongside adult mentors, FLL teams solve problems using engineering concepts, presentation techniques, and robots.
The LEGO Legend Crusaders are a sixth-eighth grade team from St. Louis School in Owensville. For this year’s biomedical research project, they came up with a way to provide more practice to children with Verbal Apraxia of Speech by converting existing video game system controllers to respond to speech commands combined with tongue and lip position.
This would enable patients to get critical practice time in, while playing the video games they already own and like. Since according to the Pediatrics Journal the average child plays 20.5 hours per week that’s a lot of practice! Their project and research so impressed their mentors, that they were encouraged to file for a provisional patent, which they did.
Their research project has also been entered in FLL’s Global Innovation Award competition. There the winning project will be awarded up to $20,000 (USD) to one winning team so they can file a US patent, create a prototype and get it on its way to becoming one of those “can’t live without it” inventions.
To see the projects under consideration go to: http://fllinnovationaward.firstlegoleague.org/, click on “Search for Teams” to find the LEGO Legend Crusaders.