The Boy Scouts of America recently announced a Robotics Merit Badge. Use the robots in this guide to meet the following requirements outlined by the BSA®
Design, build, program, test.
Do each of the following:
a- With your counselor’s approval, choose a task for the robot or robotic subsystem that you plan to build. Include sensor feedback and programming in the task. Document this information in your robot engineering notebook.
b- Design your robot. The robot design should use sen…
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The Boy Scouts of America recently announced a Robotics Merit Badge. Use the robots in this guide to meet the following requirements outlined by the BSA®
Design, build, program, test.
Do each of the following:
a- With your counselor’s approval, choose a task for the robot or robotic subsystem that you plan to build. Include sensor feedback and programming in the task. Document this information in your robot engineering notebook.
b- Design your robot. The robot design should use sensors and programming and have at least 2 degrees of freedom. Document the design in your robot engineering notebook using drawings and a written description.
c- Build a robot or robotic subsystem of your original design to accomplish the task you chose for requirement a.
d- Discuss with your counselor the programming options available for your robot. Then do either option 1 OR option 2.
Option 1. Program your robot to perform the task you chose for your robot in 4a. Include a sample of your program’s source code in your robot engineering notebook.
Option 2. Prepare a flowchart of the desired steps to program your robot for accomplishing the task in 4a. Include procedures that show activities based on sensor inputs. Place this in your robot engineering notebook.
Test your robot and record the results in your robot engineering notebook. Include suggestions on how you could improve your robot, as well as pictures or sketches of your finished robot.
Demonstrate.
Demonstrate for your counselor the robot you built in requirement 4.
Share your robot engineering notebook with your counselor. Talk about how well your robot accomplished the task, the improvements you would make in your next design, and what you learned about the design process.
Competitions.
Do ONE of the following:
Attend a robotics competition and report to your counselor what you saw and learned about the competition and how teams are organized and managed.
Learn about three youth robotics competitions. Tell your counselor about these, including the type of competition, time commitment, age of the participants, and how many teams are involved.
Careers.
Name three career opportunities in robotics. Pick one and find out the education, training, and experience required for this profession. Discuss this with your counselor, and explain why this profession might interest you.
