We conducted our Fall training rotation from November 6th to the 23rd. Training was especially important this year because we were OVERWHELMED by new students (still love y’all) and needed a new training system to catch them up to speed. Though we already had our SPURS Curriculum, we understood it turned out to be too student-driven for newer students on the team. It was a lot like Boy Scouts merit badges where you get instructions on what to do and have to figure it out yourself. This combined with our student to mentor ratio made it so a line of students would build up to get 10 minutes to ask a question to one of the mentors about how to do the thing the spur needed. Because of this, we changed our Training Style.
In comes our brand new Training Rotations!
How it Works
Every meeting day for three weeks, we put on these training rotations to train our newer students in everything we do here at Howdy Bots in small doses. This also helps them figure out what part of the team they want to be on. Each station is roughly 3 hours long, consisting of lessons, an activity and a mastery assessment. We do training so that new members without any experience, or even with some, can get a feel for FRC and what skills are needed to succeed not only here but in real world engineering fields too.
We started with identifying 8 Rotations that highlights skillsets needed for the season but also some need-to-know information such as FRC terminology. For this we decided the following 8 subject areas: CAD & Design, Basic Manufacturing, Media, Operating the Robot, Prototyping, FRC Culture, Programming, Electronics & Pneumatics.
We picked these because they give a rough overview of what each subgroup in our team does and teaches them the basics of each. Each student was assigned to a group and rotated through each station. During weekdays, we held one station but during our longer Saturday meetings we fit 2 different stations during our typical meeting time. With our current shop layout, we dedicated the office, the field, the computer lab and the workbenches as the four locations used for this.
CAD & Design
The CAD rotation consisted of teaching students how to use our CAD software Onshape and then giving them a training activity where they had to create a lego brick from a drawing with dimensions in Onshape. This gave students a good idea of how we use Onshape to design our robots and taught them how to do it.
Basic Manufacturing
In this rotation, Students learned about basic shop safety and how to use tools like the drill press and miter saw. This gave students the basic skills they would need to manufacture parts and be safe while doing it.
Media
In the media rotation, students learned about photography and the elements of design. Students were tasked with taking pictures of the other rotations around the shop and I think these are some of the best! (add photos here) It really amazes me how artistic our students can be! This gave students an overview of what business does and why it is important for our team to have a business subgroup (who do you think wrote this blog?)
Operating the Robot
This rotation was a ton of fun for everyone involved! Our Drive Coach Andrew taught students how to drive Lowrider, our 2024 robot, and about all the things you needed to do to be safe around the robot and then created a driving course so the students could practice their driving skills. We then did time trials of the course to see who was the best driver in each rotation! This gave each student a feel for how to drive the robot and got them interested in driving the robot.
Prototyping
In this rotation, students were tasked with creating a prototype intake for the 2017 game piece (big yellow wiffle balls). The goal was to move the game pieces from the ground into a tote attached to a dolly. Students were given a wide variety of items, 1 inch by 1 inch wood rods, 3D printed connectors, and whatever parts the students could find. I think the most creative robot was definitely the Dorito bot from group 3 which made creative use of a cardboard box from one of the snack boxes donated from our students and their parents (Thank you!!!) as a ramp to help pull the balls into the tote on wheels that served as the base of the “robot”. This rotation gave students a feel for prototyping and taught them how our prototyping process works and how to go from an idea to a working prototype.
FRC Culture
In this rotation, students got to learn about the culture of FRC and the meaning of FIRST and its core values: Coopertition and Gracious Professionalism. We discussed specific Howdy Bots Culture as well as student expectations for the season. We then did team building exercises to help our students learn more about each other and grow closer with other members of the team.
Programming
In the programming rotation, we learned about the basics of programming and PID controllers. For those who don’t know PID stands for proportional-integral-derivative and is used by engineers to get as close as possible to a variable like temperature or height. This gave students a good understanding of what programming does and how it affects each part of the team.
Electronics & Pneumatics
This station consisted of teaching the students the basics of electronics and how we use them to wire the robot. We learned about the different types of connectors we use to connect different parts of the robots and how to make sure that they work properly.
Overall Thoughts
All in all, our training strategy seemed to be a success from the students perspective as well as our mentors. Though it’s not perfect, it definitely is a step in the right direction to creating a more sustainable program. We asked some of our veteran but also rookie students what they thought of the new training plan.
How did you like this style of training?
“I really liked doing rotations. It gave me the opportunity to get to know other people on the team. And since I’m a rookie, I got the chance to learn about the different guilds.”
Rookie Member
“It was fun to get to experience all of the different facets of the build season. I wish I would have joined the team in time to do this as a rookie.”
Veteran Member
“I thought that this style of training helped me out a lot with gaining more experience, exploring the different options I have to choose from, and introducing me to the concepts of FRC.”
Rookie Member
What was your favorite part?!
“My favorite part of the rotations was seeing people get excited about build season and what we will be spending so much time on in the near future. I also liked driving the robot for the first time.”
Veteran Member
“My favorite part of the rotations was meeting new people that I would be working with for the rest of the year. One of the rotations that I enjoyed the most was driving and programming.”
Rookie Member
“I really enjoyed the CAD rotation. I thought it was a lot of fun and I learned a lot.”
Rookie Member
Did this help prepare you for FRC and Build Season?
“It definitely did because I was able to learn more about this specific team’s culture and FRC’s culture in general. It also helped me learn the basic concepts of FRC and what will be happening during the build season.”
Rookie Member
“Yes! And Since I met so many new people, I learned about what it means to be on this team and where I fit on this team.”
Rookie Member
“Yes – I really didn’t know much about programming especially and it was also good to jog our memories with first-hand experience with what we will be doing during build season.”
Veteran Member
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