Samo Lipovnik, OŠ Franja Goloba Prevalje
In the world full of information it is crucial to prepare children to navigate independently in the flood of information and teach them responsibility of gaining knowledge. The capability of autonomus learning is especially important in science and technology. A good scientist and innovator needs to educate himself and be able to look for new knowledge continuously. As a part of elective course Electronics and Robotics at elementary school Franja Goloba Prevalje we have participated in the First® Lego® League (FLL®) competition, an international project for promoting science and technology. In FLL® competition pupils had to show their knowledge in construction and programming an autonomous robot, which they built themselves using Lego® Mindstorms® EV3. In the technical interview they had to show their theoretical knowledge of constructing and programming. In the project category they showed their research piece in which they were searching for an innovative solution for a global issue. This year’s topic was waste and pupils designed a small bin for plastic corks, which they drew and printed from a 3D printer. They also needed to show their organisational skills and abilities to cooperate. Pupils were adopting all lesson goals and knowledge during school year autonomously. They had to organize when and where to meet, sometimes even without a teacher involved. The teacher’s role was exclusively as a mentor and coordinator because the FLL® program itself demanded that. That way they took responsibility for their own acomplishments. After brainstorming, they planned their work on weekly basis. Pupils worked on specific tasks in smaller groups. The leaders then coordinated and planed ahead. For organizing work and collecting ideas and data we used online tools like Moodle and Microsoft OneNote shared notebook. The main goals and also added values are that pupils learn how to do research work autonomously, be innovative, search for their own solutions and gain knowledge needed for work. By doing that they need to cooperate with other people, experts and companies and present their work to as many relevant people as possible. They presented their work on Youtube channel, Facebook, web page, at their municipality and to the CEO of the cooperating company. Along the proces they realized that they need the teacher for guidance and as a source of information.
