[hionwind]

If you have the time to do it, I would recommend designing a mock competition scenario (you can always choose a past game) and have your students go through the whole "kick-off" process. For 1678, this entails:

1. Everyone reading the game manual and taking a "rules test" before being allowed to proceed with the brainstorming process.

2. A brainstorm of the "what?". This means deciding on a game strategy and coming up with what you want your robot to be able to do.

3. A full-team discussion of the "how". Here, we let each student (or group of two) present their design ideas of how to accomplish the tasks you decided on step 2. We give students graph paper and expect them to draw their designs approximately to scale. We then discuss the merits of the various ideas and make a short list of mechanisms that we want to prototype.

4. Prototyping all of the ideas that have merit from step 3. This is where you could really engage a lot of your students and, like a previous post mentioned, you can use all kinds of materials (wood, cardboard, pvc pipe, etc.)

We have found that going through this process at least once before build season can really help students prepare for the real thing.

Good luck.