Thoughts from Glenn Research Center

By Devon Lee, Glenn Research High School Intern

(Ed. Note: Several INSPIRE students in the Glenn Research Center area were invited to participate in a High School Intern Program this summer. We have asked them to share some of their experiences with the OLC. JG)

On June 20th I visited an IT camp at the University of Akron with my advisors and two college interns. The purpose of our trip was to introduce the high school level students to basic robotics and programming concepts with Lego NXT robots. We first gave a short history on computers in general, and showed the students some old computer hardware. After explaining the basics of building and programming the robots, we handed out building instructions and let them get to work. Their challenge was to build a robot that could follow a crooked black line on a white background as quickly as possible. Very few of the students were familiar with the NXTs, so the other NASA interns and I guided them with their programming, and gave them hints on how they could make their robot faster.

During a pizza break, the other two interns and my advisors were discussing more advanced programs that could be used with the NXTs rather than the relatively simple ones the students were using. Alex, one of the interns, had the idea of having the NXT find the shade of the line and the background each time before it runs, rather than having it preset. This would allow the robot to accommodate different lighting conditions without having to change the program. In addition, the robot could turn at different rates depending on how far from the line it was, making it follow the line faster. As the students had already finished their programs, one of the students and I decided to try to create such a program.

We first had to find a mathematical formula to convert the numbers the sensor read into speeds for the two driving motors. After an intensive session of brainstorming, we finally came up with the equation. However, we weren't using a normal text-based language to program the robots, instead we had a visual drag-and-drop language, as it's easier to understand for the students who were new to programming. Initially we couldn't even figure out how to create a simple variable, but eventually we figured it out and got our program together. Of course, we soon realized our equation was over complicated, and devised a new one. Unfortunately, we ran out of time before we could ever test our program, but we were confident it would work.

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