Things were a little different today at Scarlett Middle School. For the activity we brought a littlebits R2D2 Droid Inventor kit for the students to build and explore with. The kit worked with an app that gave step by step instructions on how to build and test the droid.

The instructions were easy enough to follow without too much adult input and the students really enjoyed putting the parts together and testing each addition as they were added. One limit of this activity is that is something that can only be done in small groups. It was easy for people to get left out or to take over the building process. Emphasis on teamwork was necessary to keep everyone equally involved.

Once the droid was built the students were able to complete quests and challenges on the app. One challenge was to build a obstacle course and then using the app steer the droid through the books, boxes, bags and other obstacles in the way. There was definitely a learning curve with the controls. It was not as easy as it looked. Other future challenges included placing a pen in a loop on the back of the droid and using a large sheet of paper to create designs with the droids movements. It will be fun to see what possibilities the droid has in the future.