FIRST LEGO LEAGUE: The Unofficial guide: Book Review and Giveaway

Nathaniel loves building with LEGO sets, and I think it would be really great if he could be in a club of creative LEGO builders and be in competitions. He is very inventive and creative. I was very excited to review the book: "FIRST LEGO LEAGUE: the unofficial guide," because this guide has very helpful information on how to start, lead, and have a successful F.I.R.S.T LEGO League (FLL) robotics program. I think that Nathaniel would really get into building ROBOTS.

FIRST LEGO League (FLL) is an international program for kids ages 9 to 14 that combines a hands-on, interactive robotics program and research presentation with a sports-like atmosphere. It's a kind of geek Olympics for about 100,000 kids every year—a sporting event and science fair in one. There is so much to know and so many logistics with running a LEGO League, and this guide is a great tool to help you get started, and keep it going. This is not meant to be a simple competition, and fielding a team requires some serious management and plenty of work. FIRST LEGO League: The Unofficial Guide (No Starch Press, August 2008, 264 pp, ISBN 9781593271855) is the first book to offer FLL participants some guidance as they field their teams. Current and aspiring FLL participants, coaches, and teachers will find advice on how to become better competitors, builders, researchers, and team members, and they'll learn how to start and manage a team in a program that can be tricky to navigate, especially for newbies.

FIRST LEGO League: The Unofficial Guide offers in-depth coverage of topics that both rookie and experienced teams will find useful, like team formation and organization; robot building and programming; and the complex structure of the FLL competition, including the Robot Game, Technical Interview, Project, and Teamwork. Using a combination of real-life stories and candid commentary from actual FLL teams, as well as recollections of their own experiences, the authors offer an abundance of helpful guidance and dependable building and programming examples.
Readers learn how to:
*Organize, recruit, and manage a team
*Find equipment, mentors, and funding
*Design, build, and program winning robots
*Tackle each of the four FLL components—from Robot Game to Teamwork
*Use strategies and techniques from FLL masters to increase their scores

About the Authors

James Floyd Kelly has participated in numerous FLL tournaments as both a referee and a technical judge. In 2006, he founded The NXT STEP blog, widely considered the top LEGO MINDSTORMS NXT resource on the Web. Kelly is the author of LEGO MINDSTORMS NXT: The Mayan Adventure and LEGO MINDSTORMS NXT-G Programming Guide (Apress) and a co-author of The LEGO MINDSTORMS NXT Idea Book (No Starch).
Jonathan Daudelin has been competing in FLL since age 13. In 2007, his team won the First Place Robot Performance and First Place Innovative Robot awards at the World Festival after their robot achieved perfect scores in all three rounds. He is a contributor to The NXT STEP blog and a co-author of The LEGO MINDSTORMS NXT Idea Book and The NXT Robotics Competition Workbook (self-published).

Would you like to win a copy of the FIRST LEGO LEAGUE: the unofficial guide book? This contest is open to all readers living in the Continental United States. To enter the contest, what activities or programs do your kids enjoy? OR~ who would you give this book to? Click here to see how you can earn extra credits to win, and click here to see guidelines and the official rules. Contest will end on October 23RD, at 7:00 PM CST.