FIRST Robotics Competition Blog

 

 

Are you looking for content specifically for students in a particular job role? How do you know that the content is relevant for the student on the team and in their job role? FIRST^® Education has been developing courses for teams over the last year that help increase team knowledge tied to industry certifications.

 

 

For FIRST^® Robotics Competition teams, content is available to support two learning pathways: Programming/Computer Science and Design/Build. We have developed two Introduction to Programming module series for the Programming pathway. These modules are designed to be around three weeks each, where students learn Java programming fundamentals using the WPIlib. These lessons correlate with content that students might find on an Introduction to Java or AP Java course they might take as a certification or concurrent enrollment course. It includes concepts such as objects, methods, conditionals, advanced conditionals, command-based programming, and command groups. These courses utilize the Romi robot but could also be applied to traditional FIRST Robotics Competition robots.  

 

 

The next series of courses focus on the Design/Build pathway. We have released two different CAD courses that help students pursue industry certifications while also connecting that knowledge to the skills they will use on their FIRST team. These courses include concepts such as sketching, part modeling, assembly, and drawings. Students document their learning with a learning portfolio and self-assessments and these tools help students monitor their learning on their path to an industry certification. These courses are available for Solid Edge Mechanical Associate and Onshape Certified Associate certification.

 

 

We're excited about all of the learning pathways available to FIRST Robotics Competition teams and we can't wait to release more. We are hopeful to release more learning modules for next season and will share information once they are available. There will be more learning pathways to come that offer additional CAD programs as well as other areas such as fabrication, Industry 4.0, and Data Analytics. Stay tuned for these resources to guide student learning. Happy Learning!

 

 

These modules can be accessed through the FIRST Dashboard for teams using Thinkscape. To learn more about accessing Thinkscape content use these directions.