The LEGO-festival among the students of the 1st - 4th grades was held at school No. 18 of Vakhitovskiy district of Kazan on February 18th, 2011. The event was organized by initiative group of school No.18, Innovative Technopark “Idea”, Institute of Continuing Professional Education “Idea” and Centre of Lego-engineering and robotics.
The festival involved a contest of various robot simulators and other structures based on the LEGO-construction kits.
The project aim - to stimulate the youth interest in high technology branches of science and economics, development of engineering talents and formation of the future engineering and technical elite of the Republic of Tatarstan.
Organizing Committee, within the framework of Festival holding, set itself the following tasks: attracting the students’ interest in robotics and new technologies; expanding relationships of students of different districts of the city, involving in common hobby; assisting the students in acquisition of theory and practice skills of modern information technologies.
The Festival organizers noted that in the near term they have a plan to expand the festival geography and hold offsite master-classes on the areas of the Republic of Tatarstan for students studying natural sciences using modern information technologies, robotics and basic modern information technologies.
Robotics, in the educational system of foreign countries, is a popular and effective method for studying the essential fields of science, technology, engineering and mathematics.
LEGO-engineering and robotics multiple access center, established in January, 2009, on the basis of Technopark “Idea”, carries out educational activities in dimensional design, modeling, automatic control and development of engineering skills using construction kits and software tools.
In classes students get knowledge of technologies which are used in true science, engineering and design. They design, construct and program functional robot simulators. Students, carrying out simple researches, calculating and measuring mode of behavior, recording and setting out their results, turn their hobby into further education.
Educational and game situation of LEGO-centre takes a competitive form at the Regional Olympiad of robots in Kazan. The winners of this Olympiad have the opportunity to represent the Republic in the Russian Olympiad of robots in Moscow. The next stage can be the students’ participation in the International Olympiad of robots.
For example, the first Regional Olympiad of LEGO-engineering and robotics was held in Technopark “Idea” in Kazan in March, 2009. The Olympiad involved 7 teams from different Kazan schools. All of them were trained at the Centre of LEGO-engineering and robotics of Technopark “Idea” since January, 2009.
The Regional Olympiad of robots was the first qualifying stage of the International Olympiad of robots. In this respect, 3 teams winning the Regional Olympiad of robots participated in the second qualifying stage of the International Olympiad of robots, which was held in Moscow on April 18th, 2009.