FIRST Lego League

Competition details

At the beginning of the competition season, First Lego League sends official materials to each registered team, consisting of a 'challenge mat', Lego bricks, and instructions for building the items for the mat. The teams also receive a list of tasks, called 'missions', to complete involving each model on the mat (i.e. taking a loose piece from one model and placing it inside another). FLL gives teams complete freedom on how to complete the missions, providing that they are completed by a programmed LEGO Mindstorms robot with no outside assistance. The robot has two and a half minutes to complete the missions. Each team has an average of 75 days to analyze the challenge mat, design and build a LEGO Mindstorms robot, and program it to fulfill the given missions in any manner they see fit. The robot must be autonomous, and may contain only one LEGO Mindstorms programmable block and no more than 4 motors.

In addition to the live robot run, the competition has three additional judged sections. The first judging session, Core Values, is designed to detect how the team works together and uses the FLL Core Values, which include teamwork, Gracious Professionalism, and Coopertition. Teams are also asked to perform a teamwork exercise (usually timed). Secondly, in the Robot Design, or technical judging, the team explains how they designed their robot and demonstrates their programs to the judges. Thirdly, in the Project, the students must research a topic related to the current challenge and create an innovative solution. The teams have 5 minutes to present their ideas, and the judges have another 5 minutes to ask questions. Finally, the students must use the robots they designed and built to autonomously complete a set of missions on the challenge mat.

Table performance

When the official competition convenes, each team brings their robot to compete on an official challenge mat identical to their own. Two members of the team are allowed at the board during a match; however, they can switch out if needed. In the case of a serious problem, such as the entire robot breaking down, the entire team is allowed at the board for as long as the problem persists. Members are not permitted to bring additional robots or board items from other practice tables to the board during competition.

The robot starts in an area marked as 'base', a white area in the corner or to one side of the table. In base, two team members are allowed to touch the robot and start program. If the team touches the robot while it is outside of base (a 'rescue' or 'retrieve'), the touch penalty objects are removed from play. These are stationary Lego models that add to the final score if they remain until the end, providing an incentive to not rescue the robot. The robot is not required to return to base; some teams have completed all their missions without returning to base during the time allowed to complete the missions. In fact, in the 2008–09, 2009-10, 2011-2012, and 2012-13 challenges, points were awarded if the robot was in one of two specified areas, not including base, at the end of the two and a half minute match.

FIRST LEGO League teams use LEGO Mindstorms kits to construct their robots. The robots are programmed using one of the block-based programming environments: the official EV3 software, the official NXT-G software (now outdated), or Robolab. All these are built around Labview.

Events

Teams in different parts of the world have different times allotted to complete the construction of the robot, due to the varying date of qualifying tournaments. They go on to compete in FLL tournaments, similar to the FIRST Robotics Competition regionals. In the 2006–07 season, nearly 90,000 students on 8,846 teams from around the world competed. The initial levels of competition are managed by a FIRST State Partner (such as NC FIRST). The Partner has complete control over all official tournaments in their region. Most Partners have a two-tier system; teams first go to a local tournament, and selected teams go on to states.

The largest single-day regional qualifying tournament is hosted by First State Robotics and First State FIRST LEGO League in Wilmington, Delaware. Taking place every January, this event holds FIRST LEGO League Jr. (FLL Jr.; grades K-3), FIRST LEGO League (FLL; grades 4–8), FIRST Tech Challenge (FTC; grades 9–12), FIRST Robotics Competition (FRC; grades 9–12), and robot sumo competitions under one roof at the University of Delaware's Bob Carpenter Center. Teams from Eastern Pennsylvania, Southern New Jersey, Delaware, and Maryland (among other regions) attend this tournament to make it the largest single-day FIRST event in the world.

The only competition run by FIRST is the FIRST World Festival. This is technically not an official level of competition because not all states may attend (there is a lottery system). In 2007, 96 teams competed in the FLL World Festival in Atlanta, Georgia on April 27–30. The 2007–08 Power Puzzle FLL World Festival and the 2008–09 FLL World Festival on Climate Connections were held again in the Georgia Dome and Georgia World Congress Center. Starting with the 2010–11, FLL World Festival is held at the Edward Jones Dome and America's Center in St. Louis.

Additionally, the Champions Award winners from each state/provincial tournament may participate in one of the Open Championships which are organized by FLL Partners or a private invitational (such a Razorback University or LEGOland CA).

As such, teams are normally allowed to win only one core (judged) award. Teams can win an additional award based on their robot's performance during the robot game competition portion of the tournament.

Competition themes

The challenges for FLL are based on several different themes:

Recent developments

The original robotics kit used by FLL was the RCX Mindstorms kit, which LEGO no longer sells to the general public. In August 2006, LEGO released a new Mindstorms kit called the NXT. In 2006 and 2007, teams using the RCX could earn "fairness bonus" points based on the fact that the RCX was less technologically advanced. However, the "fairness bonus" was discontinued for the 2008-09 season because tournament experience proved that the RCX teams were competitive and did not need it. In 2013, the NXT series kit was superseded by the EV3 series and the competition guidelines were updated to allow both EV3 and NXT-based robots to compete.

Global Innovation Award

Officially registered teams can also compete in the Global Innovation Award, where they could win a grant to make their project a reality. As of World Class, the First Place team wins $20,000 and the other two Finalists each win $5,000. The money can be used to further the team's ideas or to continue in FIRST programs. Every team member on a Finalist team also receives one LEGO Mindstorms EV3 Home Edition set. The teams must submit their ideas using an online interface by completing a team summary (public), a idea summary (public), and 4 detailed idea analysis (private). The questions have strict size limits (500-1000 chars). After the deadline, the submissions are reviewed by a panel of judges consisting of experts from engineering and industrial fields as well as experts in the challenge theme for that year. Teams are judged on problem identification, innovation, implementation, and effective use of STEM principles. Twenty teams are selected to move on to the Semi-Finalist event at the FLL World Festival, where 3 Finalists are selected to move on to an event in Washington, D.C. At the D.C. event, the winner of the $20,000 award is announced.