FLL mentors

[Laaba 80]

Originally Posted by Gregor

Last year (Food Factor) and this year (Senior Solutions), it has been made impossible to complete every mission. FLL has stated multiple times that it is impossible to reach the maximum score.

There is still no reason to tell them they can't do everything. Just make sure they prioritize the missions by points. Once they get one working, move on to the next one. The only missions that will not be fully completed are the tie breaker missions that require going back and forth from base. If they can get to that point, they should be striving to reduce time so they can get more points out of those missions. Although they cannot technically complete every mission, telling them so will serve no benefit, and will just lead to them settling for less than their best.

[wendymom]

We always start every meeting with a game or team building activity. (it gets the wiggles out of their systems)

Learn to ask questions like...That didn't seem to work, what could you do to change the outcome? We have two different ideas, what is a good way for us to decide which one to use? What if you tried X Y Z, would that make a difference?

Stress to the PARENTS that they are to be HANDS OFF. You will also have to remember to be hands off (that is the hardest part for my high schoolers when they are mentoring)

Practice the YMCA, cupid shuffle and electric slide before going to a competition. Make sure you are out on the dance floor being goofy with them.

Make sure everyone participates in at least one mission and at least has one line in the presentation.

This sounds silly but: Make sure they know each others names. (we found out a couple of days before an event that they never learned names but managed to communicate for 3 months without it)

Practice your presentation in front of anyone who will sit still for you. Make sure you ask questions so they can practice answering. Make sure they know it is ok to say they don't know to an answer instead of just making something up.

Good Luck and have fun

[sg999]

I've never been on an FLL team (it was started the year I aged out), so where would I be able to find more information on what to expect at a competition (or are they called festivals?), what to expect from a presentations judge, and from a core values judge?

Also, from your posts, I can assume that you guys (high school students) weren't just helpers, but rather ran parts of meetings? How involved were you guys relative to the teachers (for those FLL teams that have teachers)?

Thanks for all the awesome advice so far, by the way.

[mlantry]

Originally Posted by sg999

I've never been on an FLL team (it was started the year I aged out), so where would I be able to find more information on what to expect at a competition (or are they called festivals?), what to expect from a presentations judge, and from a core values judge?

Also, from your posts, I can assume that you guys (high school students) weren't just helpers, but rather ran parts of meetings? How involved were you guys relative to the teachers (for those FLL teams that have teachers)?

Thanks for all the awesome advice so far, by the way.

In regards to the teachers really involved pretty much what we do is talk about the team who works well with who, things like that, also about what we expect them to be able to do things like that. In regards to getting more info on fll competion it's real easy go the FIRST website to the FLL page and go to Senior solutions. hope this helps