Day 1: First Flight - Sphero Logic Basics

Robotics Engineer Pathway - Coordinate Systems and Movement

1. Spark

Woven notebook: open your notebook now. Use it to capture every prediction, partner discussion, and question that comes up in this phase. Your notebook is the record of your thinking.

Welcome. For the next 6 weeks you will work through 5 different labs - robots, drones, medicine, renewable energy, and a research showcase. Real experiments, real data. Today is Day 1.

The Hook: A Mars rover got stuck in a Martian sand dune. Engineers had 90 minutes to talk it out before sunset killed the radio. They could not see what was around it. They could only send numbers: heading, distance, speed. The rover did exactly what those numbers said. If the numbers were wrong, the rover was lost. Today you are those engineers. Your Sphero is the rover. Your code is the radio call.

NASA: 7 Minutes of Terror

Watch NASA engineers describe the math, code, and timing it takes to land a rover on Mars. You are the same kind of engineer today, just at a smaller scale.

Foundations - Heading, Speed, Duration

A Sphero BOLT takes three numbers to move: heading (0 to 359 degrees, where 0 is forward), speed (0 to 255), and duration (in seconds). Three numbers, every move.

Compass Cheat Sheet: 0 degrees = forward (away from you when aimed) 90 degrees = right 180 degrees = backward 270 degrees = left The blue tail light shows the back. Always aim with the tail toward you before you press Run.

1Talk to your partner: if a rover is given heading 90, speed 100, duration 2 seconds, where does it end up relative to the start?

2Predict: what would change if you doubled the duration? What would change if you doubled the speed?

I can name the three numbers a Sphero needs to move

2. Lab

Woven notebook: keep your notebook open as you build. Record your hypothesis, every measurement and observation, and what surprised you. Your notebook is your lab record for today.

Materials per pair: 1 Sphero BOLT, 1 iPad or Chromebook with Sphero Edu app installed, masking tape arena (1 m x 1 m), notebook, pencil. Charging dock central. Do not power on until told.

Today's task with Sphero Edu: program your robot to drive a perfect square - the same logic Mars rovers use to map a region of the planet. You will tune speed, heading, and time until the path closes back on itself. Code Here - Sphero Edu: Pick the device in front of you (works on iPhone, iPad, Android, Chromebook, Windows, macOS, or any Chrome browser): - Web app: https://edu.sphero.com/code - All-platforms download page: https://edu.sphero.com/downloads - App stores: search 'Sphero Edu' Sign in: tap 'Join Your Class' and enter the 6-character class code your instructor shares. Connect your robot: hold your BOLT near your device and tap its name when it pops up. The app finds it via Bluetooth.

This is Sphero BOLT

Carefully watch this video to learn the tool before you use it. Sphero's official 90-second intro to the BOLT robot. Watch this once before you connect.

Connect Sphero to the Sphero Edu App

Watch this video to see exactly how the technique works before you try it. How to pair your BOLT with the app over Bluetooth. Step-by-step.

The Hypothesis

1Write your predicted code in your notebook: four roll commands with heading, speed, and duration for each side. Use speed 60 to start.

The Build - Square Path

Iterative Design Rule: Your first run will not be perfect. That is normal. Real engineers do not get the answer on attempt 1. They get it on attempt 4 or 7. Today's goal is NOT a perfect square; it is to get within 5 cm of start by adjusting your code each round. Try, measure, adjust, try again. Repeat until it works. That loop IS engineering.

Watch the floor type. Carpet kills speed. Smooth tile lets the Sphero overshoot. The same code gives different answers on different surfaces - this matters for the rest of the week.

2Open Sphero Edu. Tap Programs. Tap +. Choose Block Canvas. Connect to your BOLT (the name shows on its underside).

3Aim the robot: tail toward you, blue light visible. This sets heading 0 = away from you.

4Drag four Roll blocks. Set heading 0, 90, 180, 270 in that order. Speed 60. Duration 2 seconds each. Add a Stop block at the end.

5Press Play. Watch where it lands. Did it return to start? Measure the gap with a ruler. Record in cm.

6Iterate: if it overshot, lower duration. If it undershot, raise duration. Run again. Record the new gap.

7Goal: get within 5 cm of start in 3 attempts. When you hit it, take a photo of your code with your iPad and paste the screenshot into your notebook (or sketch the blocks).

I drove a square path within 5 cm of the start

I recorded the surface type in my notebook

3. AI Check

Woven notebook: as the AI helps or fails, write down exactly what you fed it and what it gave back. The trail of prompts and outputs IS your data.

Get to Know BOLT+: STEM, CS & AI Learning

LONG VIDEO (skim, do not watch all the way through). Sphero's overview of how BOLT+ teaches AI. Watch 2-3 minutes to get familiar with the AI Assistant - that is the feature you are about to use to audit your triangle code.

Sphero Session: AI Literacy Through Hands-On Learning

LONG VIDEO (skim, do not watch all the way through). Sphero educators walk through the AI Assistant in real classrooms. Skim 2-3 minutes for ideas. Look for: 'Explain My Program' and 'Code Review' - both are buttons inside Sphero Edu.

Bring in the AI Assistant

The Sphero Edu app has an AI Assistant built in. Heads up: it is NOT a chatbot. When you tap it you get BUTTONS, not a place to type. It can 'Explain My Program' and run a 'Code Review' on the code YOU built. It will not write the code for you. Your job today: build the triangle yourself, then make the AI audit your work - and audit the AI right back.

1Build the triangle yourself first. Drag three Roll blocks, speed 60, duration 2 seconds each, then a Stop block. The headings are the puzzle: an equilateral triangle does NOT use 0, 60, 120. Write your three predicted headings in your notebook before you run anything.

2Tap the sparkle icon at the top of your canvas to open the Sphero AI Assistant. Notice there is no text box - just buttons. This tool reviews and explains the code you wrote.

3Tap 'Explain My Program.' Read how the AI describes your triangle code. Does its explanation match what you intended? Now tap it a SECOND time. Did the wording change? Write both versions in your notebook. An AI that gives two different answers to the same code is telling you something about how much to trust it.

An equilateral triangle has 60-degree interior angles, but the EXTERIOR turn (which is what the robot makes) is 120 degrees. Headings: 0, 120, 240. Many AIs get this wrong on the first try.

4Tap 'Code Review.' Write down every issue it flags - AND what it does NOT flag. Then run your code. Did the triangle close? Measure the gap. Here is the trap: did Code Review warn you about your headings? It probably did not, because wrong headings are still valid blocks. The AI checks your syntax, not your physics.

5Fix the headings yourself (the AI will not do it for you) - try 0, 120, 240. Run again. Record both gaps in your notebook: first-try gap and after-fix gap. You, not the AI, closed the triangle.

An AI that is confidently wrong is more dangerous than one that admits it does not know. Throughout this summer you will hear AIs claim certainty they do not have. Your notebook is the receipt that catches them.

4. Class Data

Woven notebook: pull your data into a clean table. Write the trend you see in one sentence. If you cannot describe it in one sentence, you do not understand it yet.

Synthesis - Class Data

Write your team's gap numbers on the class whiteboard table. Now look at the pattern across all pairs.

Copy this table into your Woven notebook BEFORE class data collection starts. Sketch the column headers neatly on a fresh page. As teams report data, fill in your notebook copy AND watch the teacher fill the same table on the whiteboard / slide. Your notebook is your team's permanent record. The projection is shared visibility for the class.

Trial	Code Source	Goal Path	Avg Class Gap (cm)
1	Student	Square	fill in
2	AI v1	Triangle	fill in
3	AI v2	Triangle	fill in

1Which trial had the smallest average gap? Was it always the human, or did the AI sometimes win?

2Calculate the percent change between AI v1 and AI v2 gaps. Did the AI improve when corrected?

Surfaces matter. Code matters. Aim matters. A robot that drives accurately is the product of all three. Engineers call this the 'control loop' - and the rest of this summer is about making your loops tighter.

5. Wrap

Woven notebook: answer the reflection prompts in writing before you leave. Tomorrow's session starts where today's notebook ends.

Pathway: Robotics Engineer

Day in the Life - Boston Dynamics Robotics Engineer

Watch this video to picture yourself in this career 5 to 10 years from now. What a real robotics engineer's day actually looks like. Same skills you used today, scaled up.

Robotics Engineer: What they do: design and program machines that move through space - on Mars, in warehouses, in surgery suites. Entry pathway: BS in Mechanical or Electrical Engineering or Computer Science with robotics electives. Cal State LA offers a Mechatronics minor and an MS in Robotics. Salary band (BLS, Los Angeles MSA, 2024): entry 78,000 to 95,000. Mid-career 110,000 to 145,000. First step from where you sit today: keep your Sphero programs in a portfolio. Apply to Cal State LA's robotics summer programs.

Spotlight - Dr. Mae Jemison: Dr. Jemison (1956 to present) is an engineer, a medical doctor, and the first Black woman in space (NASA Mission STS-47, 1992). She studied chemical engineering at Stanford, became a Peace Corps doctor in West Africa, and then trained as a NASA astronaut. Her path was multi-discipline before that was a thing. She did not pick engineering OR medicine OR space - she did all three. The robotics work you do today and the medical work you do in Week 4 connect through people like her.

Reflection

1Reflection 1: What surprised you most about programming a robot today?

2Reflection 2: When the AI was wrong, how did you know it was wrong?

3Reflection 3: If you imagine yourself building robots in 8 years, what part of today felt like a glimpse of that future?

I completed Day 1

I have 3 reflection answers in my notebook

I know what 'heading, speed, duration' means

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Day 2: Logic Gates - If/Then/Else in Motion

Robotics Engineer Pathway - Conditional Logic

1. Spark

Woven notebook: open your notebook now. Use it to capture every prediction, partner discussion, and question that comes up in this phase. Your notebook is the record of your thinking.

How Self-Driving Cars See

Watch the video to set up today's thinking - this is the real-world story behind the lab. How autonomous vehicles use logic gates and sensor input to make decisions. Same idea, smaller robot.

Foundations - The Three Words

Yesterday you told the Sphero exactly what to do, step by step. Today you give it a brain. Instead of 'roll forward 2 seconds,' you say 'roll forward UNTIL you bump into something, THEN turn.' That is conditional logic, and it is how every robot, app, and self-driving car decides anything.

The Hook: A Tesla on autopilot sees a traffic cone in the road. In 30 milliseconds it has to decide: brake, swerve, or ignore. The decision is not made by a human. It is made by IF/THEN/ELSE statements running in a chip the size of your thumbnail. Today you write your first one.

IF a condition is true, THEN do this action, ELSE do something different. Example in plain English: IF the floor color is red, THEN stop. ELSE keep rolling. The Sphero BOLT has color sensors on its bottom. It can read the floor in real time.

1Talk to your partner: name three IF/THEN decisions you made this morning before walking in here.

2Predict: if a Sphero is told 'IF speed > 100, THEN turn left,' what speed would NOT trigger a left turn?

I can write an IF/THEN/ELSE statement in plain English

2. Lab

Woven notebook: keep your notebook open as you build. Record your hypothesis, every measurement and observation, and what surprised you. Your notebook is your lab record for today.

Materials per pair: 1 Sphero BOLT, iPad with Sphero Edu, red construction paper strips (2), green construction paper strips (2), masking tape, notebook. Build a track on the floor: green = go, red = stop.

Today's task with Sphero Edu: add IF/THEN logic so your Sphero stops when its color sensor sees red - the same conditional logic that runs every autonomous car at every stoplight. Code Here - Sphero Edu: Pick the device in front of you (works on iPhone, iPad, Android, Chromebook, Windows, macOS, or any Chrome browser): - Web app: https://edu.sphero.com/code - All-platforms download page: https://edu.sphero.com/downloads - App stores: search 'Sphero Edu' Sign in: tap 'Join Your Class' and enter the 6-character class code your instructor shares. Connect your robot: hold your BOLT near your device and tap its name when it pops up. The app finds it via Bluetooth.

Basics of Sphero BOLT Coding

Carefully watch this video to learn the tool before you use it. Run-through of Sphero Edu's block canvas, sensor blocks, and IF/THEN statements. Watch this before you build your stoplight robot.

The Hypothesis

1Sketch your track in your notebook. Label where green and red zones are. Predict what code will let your Sphero stop on red and roll on green.

The Build - Stoplight Robot

2In Sphero Edu, drag a Forever Loop block. Inside, add an IF block that asks: 'IF Color Sensor = Red.' Inside the IF, add Stop. Add an ELSE that says Roll forward at speed 50.

3Place your Sphero on green. Press Run. Does it roll? Now slide a red strip into its path. Does it stop?

4Iterate: adjust speed so it does not overshoot the red zone. Find the speed where it always stops on the red strip.

5Challenge: add a second condition. IF green THEN go fast. IF yellow THEN go slow. IF red THEN stop. Test the three-state stoplight.

If your Sphero does not detect the color, lift it, restart the program, and check that the floor is well-lit but not glaring. The sensor is sensitive.

I built a working stoplight with at least 2 conditions

I tested at least 3 different speeds

3. AI Check

Woven notebook: as the AI helps or fails, write down exactly what you fed it and what it gave back. The trail of prompts and outputs IS your data.

AI Audit Checklist - Stoplight Robot: Open the Sphero AI Assistant (sparkle icon at the top of your canvas). Remember: it has buttons, not a chat box. Tap 'Explain My Program' and 'Code Review' to audit the code YOU built. What to check as the AI explains your code: - Did you use a Forever loop so the program runs continuously? - Did you nest the IF statements (color check inside the loop, tilt check inside the color check)? - Did you set the right speeds for each color? - Did you forget the ELSE branch - and did Code Review catch it, or miss it?

AI Assistant - Nested Logic

Your stoplight has 2 or 3 conditions. Real robots use dozens. A self-driving car checks color, distance, speed, and angle all at once. Add a fourth condition yourself, then let the AI check your nesting.

1Add the new condition to YOUR stoplight: reverse if the tilt is more than 30 degrees. Nest it inside the loop. Then tap the sparkle icon and tap 'Explain My Program.'

2Read how the AI explains your nested logic. Did it correctly describe the loop and the nested IFs, or did it get the nesting order wrong? Mark every block in your notebook: correct, wrong, or unsure.

3Run it. Watch what fails. Now tap 'Code Review.' Did it catch the tilt bug, or did it pass your code? Write down what Code Review found AND what it missed.

4Fix the nesting yourself, re-run Code Review, and test again. How many tries did it take YOU to get a working program? The AI reviewed; you engineered.

Real engineers use AI to review code, then audit every line themselves. They never trust a passing review without testing. You just did the same thing - that is the actual workflow.

4. Class Data

Woven notebook: pull your data into a clean table. Write the trend you see in one sentence. If you cannot describe it in one sentence, you do not understand it yet.

Synthesis - Prompt Quality vs Iteration Count

Pair	Prompt Length	AI Iterations Needed	Final Status
Yours	fill in	fill in	works / partial / fails
Class avg	share	share	share

1Write the EXACT prompt that finally worked. What did it have that your first prompt did not?

Engineers call this 'prompt engineering.' The clearer your specification, the fewer the iterations. This is a real job skill.

5. Wrap

Woven notebook: answer the reflection prompts in writing before you leave. Tomorrow's session starts where today's notebook ends.

Pathway: Robotics Engineer - Conditional Logic

Day at Work: Robotics Engineer

Watch this video to picture yourself in this career 5 to 10 years from now. What a robotics engineer's actual day looks like - the conditional logic you wrote today is core to her job.

Robotics Engineer (Software side): What they do: write the decision logic that lets robots react to the world - color, sound, distance, force. Entry pathway: BS in Computer Science or Computer Engineering with control-systems coursework. Cal State LA's BS CS + Robotics minor or MS in Mechatronics covers this. Salary band (BLS, Los Angeles MSA, 2024): entry 82,000 to 98,000. Mid-career 115,000 to 150,000. First step from where you sit today: build a portfolio on GitHub starting with a Sphero project this week.

Reflection

1Reflection 1: When did your code do something you did not expect? What did you learn?

2Reflection 2: What is one IF/THEN decision you make every day without thinking?

3Reflection 3: How would you describe the difference between human logic and code logic to a 4th grader?

I completed Day 2

I built a multi-conditional program

I have 3 reflection answers

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Day 3: Secret Missions - Pathfinding Algorithms

Robotics Engineer Pathway - Algorithmic Thinking

1. Spark

Woven notebook: open your notebook now. Use it to capture every prediction, partner discussion, and question that comes up in this phase. Your notebook is the record of your thinking.

A* Pathfinding Visualized

Watch the video to set up today's thinking - this is the real-world story behind the lab. A clean visualization of how a search algorithm finds the shortest path. We are going to do this with code today.

Foundations - Three Pathfinding Strategies

Yesterday you taught your robot to make decisions. Today you teach it to PLAN. Here is what we are doing today: you and your partner will BUILD A MAZE on the floor with tape, boxes, and string. Then you will program your Sphero to find its way from Start to Goal three different ways. The fastest team gets bragging rights. Why a maze? Because every robot, every video game character, every Google Maps route uses the same kind of pathfinding code you are about to write.

The Hook: Google Maps checks 7 billion possible routes between any two points in the world before it shows you one. It does this in under 0.4 seconds. The algorithm it uses is over 60 years old - invented by a mathematician named Edsger Dijkstra who scribbled it on a napkin in a coffee shop in 1956. Today's mission: you BUILD a maze on the classroom floor (tape, boxes, string), then code your Sphero to drive it three ways - shortest path, fastest path, and AI's path. The team that beats their own best time wins.

Strategy 1: Greedy. Always head straight at the goal. Fast but bumps into walls. Strategy 2: BFS (Breadth-First Search). Try every path level by level. Slow but always finds something. Strategy 3: Dijkstra. Try paths in order of total cost. Fastest known way to find the GUARANTEED shortest path. Google Maps uses a flavor of Dijkstra. So does your video game's enemy AI. So does the routing on a UPS truck.

1Talk to your partner: when you walk from your front door to your favorite spot in your neighborhood, do you take the shortest path or the easiest path? Are they the same?

2Predict: in your maze, will the SHORTEST path always be the FASTEST path? Why or why not?

I can name 3 pathfinding strategies

2. Lab

Woven notebook: keep your notebook open as you build. Record your hypothesis, every measurement and observation, and what surprised you. Your notebook is your lab record for today.

Materials per pair: 1 Sphero BOLT, iPad, masking tape, 4-6 cardboard boxes as obstacles, plus string or red yarn (for laser-grid effect), 3 small objects (the 'targets' to retrieve), ruler, notebook. Floor maze: 2 m by 2 m square with 4 obstacles inside. Start at one corner, Goal at the opposite corner.

Today's task with Sphero Edu: write the code that solves a physical maze - your first real pathfinding algorithm. Code Here - Sphero Edu: Pick the device in front of you (works on iPhone, iPad, Android, Chromebook, Windows, macOS, or any Chrome browser): - Web app: https://edu.sphero.com/code - All-platforms download page: https://edu.sphero.com/downloads - App stores: search 'Sphero Edu' Sign in: tap 'Join Your Class' and enter the 6-character class code your instructor shares. Connect your robot: hold your BOLT near your device and tap its name when it pops up. The app finds it via Bluetooth.

Mission Requirements - Your Maze MUST Have: Build: - At least 3 obstacles (boxes, books, cardboard towers) - A laser maze section (string or red yarn stretched at Sphero height to dodge) - At least one secret passage (a hidden route the Sphero can take) Code: - Minimum of 10 blocks total - At least one DIRECTION block (Roll) - At least one LOOP block (Repeat or Forever) - At least one COLOR block (Set Main LED, or color-sensor IF) - At least one SENSOR block (Color Sensor, IR, or Tilt) - A 'secret coded message' delivered via the LED matrix or color sequence Tip: use the 8x8 LED matrix on the BOLT to flash a color code. Make a key (red = stop, green = clue 1, blue = clue 2). The color sequence IS your secret message.

The Hypothesis

1In your notebook, sketch the maze top-down. Mark Start, Goal, and obstacles. Sketch THREE possible paths from Start to Goal. Then PREDICT: which of your 3 paths will solve the maze fastest? Circle that path, and write a one-sentence reason (shortest? fewest turns? safest from obstacles?).

The Build - The Secret Mission Maze

How to Use the Sphero Pathfinder Simulator (below): This simulator is your VIRTUAL MAZE TRAINER. Use it BEFORE you spend 10 minutes coding your real Sphero through the physical maze you built. How: 1. Pick one of the 3 preset challenges (Easy / Medium / Hard) at the top. 2. Drag Forward, Turn Left, and Turn Right blocks into the sequencer panel on the right. 3. Click 'Run' to watch the simulator's Sphero attempt your path. 4. If the Sphero crashes into a wall, the screen tells you which step failed. Edit and re-run. 5. Once you can solve a preset cleanly, you have the pathfinding intuition you need to code your real Sphero through the physical maze. Treat this as a 5-minute practice round, then go to your physical maze.

2Open the Sphero Pathfinder simulator (above). Drag obstacles to match your physical maze. Run the simulator's pathfinding to see ONE possible solution path before you write your own code - this is your reference, not your answer.

3Now write your OWN pathfinding code in Sphero Edu. Compare: did you take the same path as the simulator? A faster one? A safer one? Record your route and timing in your notebook.

4Predict: which of your 3 paths is the SHORTEST in distance? Which is the FASTEST in time given the Sphero needs to slow down to turn?

5Pick your shortest-distance path. Code it as a sequence of Roll blocks. Time it with a stopwatch from start to goal.

6Now code your fastest-TIME path - usually the one with fewer turns, even if it is longer. Time it.

7Record both times in your notebook. Calculate the difference.

8Trade mazes with another team. Solve theirs in under 90 seconds of code time. Run their solution. Did it work?

9When you finish testing your maze, swap with another team. Run their maze. Tell them ONE thing that worked and ONE thing that could be better. Listen to their feedback on yours. This is the most important part.

Watch the corners. Sphero turns are imperfect at high speed. A faster speed often means a wider turn radius and you smash the box.

I tested at least 2 different paths through my maze

I recorded times for each

3. AI Check

Woven notebook: as the AI helps or fails, write down exactly what you fed it and what it gave back. The trail of prompts and outputs IS your data.

AI as Pathfinder

1The Sphero AI Assistant cannot plan a path - it only reviews code you already built. So for this test, open Gemini (https://gemini.google.com). Describe your maze in plain English with coordinates: 'Obstacle at (50 cm, 50 cm), size 20 cm by 20 cm. Start at (0, 0). Goal at (200 cm, 200 cm).'

2Ask Gemini: 'Generate the shortest path from start to goal that avoids all obstacles. Give it as a list of headings and distances I can program on a Sphero.'

3Read the path. Trace it in your notebook on top of your maze sketch. Did the AI's path actually avoid the obstacles, or did it cut through one?

4Code Gemini's path onto your Sphero as Roll blocks and run it. Time it. Compare to your human-built fastest-time path. Who won?

AI is bad at spatial reasoning right now. Even Gemini and Claude routinely get coordinate-based mazes wrong. This is one of the open problems in AI research today. You just hit a frontier.

4. Class Data

Woven notebook: pull your data into a clean table. Write the trend you see in one sentence. If you cannot describe it in one sentence, you do not understand it yet.

Synthesis - Human vs AI Pathfinding

Solver	Path Distance (cm)	Time to Goal (sec)	Crashes
Human v1	fill	fill	fill
Human v2	fill	fill	fill
AI	fill	fill	fill

1Which solver had the cleanest run? Which had the shortest path? Were they the same solver?

In real robotics, humans plan the high-level strategy and AI executes the low-level path tweaks. The combination beats either alone. Today you saw why.

5. Wrap

Woven notebook: answer the reflection prompts in writing before you leave. Tomorrow's session starts where today's notebook ends.

Pathway: Autonomous Systems Engineer

Careers in Robotics Engineering

Watch this video to picture yourself in this career 5 to 10 years from now. A working engineer building autonomous robots for a recycling plant. Pathfinding code at industrial scale.

Autonomous Systems Engineer: What they do: write the algorithms that let warehouse robots, drones, and self-driving cars find their way through a real-world space. Entry pathway: BS Computer Science or Computer Engineering with algorithms and AI coursework. Cal State LA offers AI-focused electives in the CS department. Salary band (BLS / Glassdoor LA 2024): entry 90,000 to 110,000. Mid-career 130,000 to 175,000. Senior 200,000 plus. First step from where you sit today: solve all 30 problems on LeetCode's BFS/DFS section by end of summer. Free.

Reflection

1Reflection 1: What surprised you about how the AI found (or failed to find) a path?

2Reflection 2: When have you taken a longer route on purpose? Why?

3Reflection 3: If algorithms decide your route, your search results, and your news feed - how do you know if they are picking well for you?

Spotlight: Dr. Gladys West: Dr. West (1930 to 2026) was a mathematician whose work is inside almost every robot today. She did the complex math and programming that created the foundation for GPS - the Global Positioning System. When you program a Sphero to move to a specific coordinate or follow a path, you are using technology that Dr. West helped invent. Pathfinding algorithms exist on top of her math. For most of her career, her name was barely known. She was inducted into the Air Force Hall of Fame at age 88. Brilliance is sometimes invisible until someone bothers to look.

4Reflection 4 (peer credit): name ONE thing you saw another team do better than you. Name ONE person who helped you today. Thank them out loud before you leave.

I completed Day 3

I beat the AI on at least one path

Reflection answers in notebook

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Day 4: Speedway Showdown - Human vs AI

Robotics Engineer Pathway - Human-AI Collaboration

1. Spark

Woven notebook: open your notebook now. Use it to capture every prediction, partner discussion, and question that comes up in this phase. Your notebook is the record of your thinking.

Today's goal: race ONE classroom maze three different ways. First with only your own code. Then with only AI's code. Then with you and the AI working together. Best time wins.

The Hook: In 2017 the world's best Go player Lee Sedol lost to an AI called AlphaGo. The world thought humans were done. Two years later, a chess study found that a mid-skill human PLUS a mid-quality AI beat both top humans alone AND top AIs alone. The lesson: collaboration wins. Today you test that yourself with a Sphero, a maze, and three different ways of writing the code that solves it.

How Self-Driving Cars Decide

Watch the video to set up today's thinking - how autonomous systems balance human input with AI suggestions in real-time. Today we test the same tradeoff with our Spheros.

Foundations - The Three Modes

Mode 1 - Pure Human: you write every line of code yourself. No AI. Mode 2 - Pure AI: you describe the goal in one prompt to Gemini and run whatever it gives you, without edits. (We use Gemini here because the Sphero AI Assistant only reviews code - it cannot generate a path from a prompt.) Mode 3 - Collaboration: you generate with Gemini, then audit, edit, and iterate before running. Same maze. Three modes. Best time wins. Crashes count as DNF (did not finish).

1Predict: which mode do you think will be fastest? Why?

I understand the three modes of today's challenge

2. Lab

Woven notebook: keep your notebook open as you build. Record your hypothesis, every measurement and observation, and what surprised you. Your notebook is your lab record for today.

Materials per pair: 1 Sphero BOLT, 1 iPad with Sphero Edu, stopwatch, notebook. ONE shared maze at the front of the room (your instructor sets it up - same maze for every team, so times are comparable). Whiteboard scoreboard at the front with 3 columns: Human, AI, Collab.

Today's task with Sphero Edu: write your fastest pathfinder code, then race it head-to-head against an AI-written version (you bring AI in during Phase 3). Code Here - Sphero Edu: Pick the device in front of you (works on iPhone, iPad, Android, Chromebook, Windows, macOS, or any Chrome browser): - Web app: https://edu.sphero.com/code - All-platforms download page: https://edu.sphero.com/downloads - App stores: search 'Sphero Edu' Sign in: tap 'Join Your Class' and enter the 6-character class code your instructor shares. Connect your robot: hold your BOLT near your device and tap its name when it pops up. The app finds it via Bluetooth.

The Hypothesis

1Predict your time for each mode. Write 3 numbers in your notebook before you start.

Set up your team's SHOWDOWN SCOREBOARD now. Turn to a fresh page in your Woven notebook. Draw a 4-column table with these headers: Mode | Predicted time | Actual time | Notes. Add 3 rows labeled Pure Human, Pure AI, Collaboration. You will fill this in as you run each mode below. The class also tracks combined times on a whiteboard up front - but your notebook scoreboard is your team's permanent record. (The embedded Showdown app's scoreboard cannot be filled in or saved - your notebook is the real one.)

Mode 1 - Pure Human

2No AI this round. Code the maze solution from scratch yourself. Time from 'start coding' to 'Sphero crosses goal line'. Write the time in your notebook SHOWDOWN SCOREBOARD (Pure Human row, Actual time column) AND on the class whiteboard so other teams can see.

Mode 2 - Pure AI

3Reset. Open Gemini. Write ONE prompt describing the maze and the goal, asking for the path as Sphero Roll blocks (headings and distances). Code exactly what it gives you onto the Sphero without editing. Run it. Time it. If it crashes, that is real data - record DNF. Write the time (or DNF) in your notebook SHOWDOWN SCOREBOARD (Pure AI row) AND on the class whiteboard.

Mode 3 - Collaboration

4Reset. Use Gemini to draft the path, then code it onto the Sphero. Read the code. Edit anything that looks wrong. Iterate up to 3 times. Run. Time it. Write the time in your notebook SHOWDOWN SCOREBOARD (Collaboration row) AND on the class whiteboard.

5Compare your 3 times to your predictions. Which mode actually won?

DNFs count. If pure AI fails, that is real data. Half of pure-AI runs in real software engineering also fail.

I ran all 3 modes

All 3 times on the scoreboard

3. AI Check

Woven notebook: as the AI helps or fails, write down exactly what you fed it and what it gave back. The trail of prompts and outputs IS your data.

Why this app: today in Phase 2 you wrote your OWN maze code. Now run the same maze 3 ways back-to-back - Pure Human, Pure AI, Collaboration - and see whose pathfinder wins. The Sphero Pathfinder simulator (below) runs each 60-second match for you and posts times to a class scoreboard. You are not learning the simulator; you are using it as a stopwatch + arena to test the question: who is faster, you or the AI? Run all 3 modes before reading the steps below.

1Open the Showdown app (above). Run all 3 modes back-to-back: Pure Human (your code only), Pure AI (AI code only), Collaboration (you write, AI tweaks). After each run, the app shows your time. Since the app's scoreboard cannot be saved, copy each time into your notebook SHOWDOWN SCOREBOARD (the page you set up in Phase 2) AND on the class whiteboard.

2Compare your team's 3 times. Which mode was fastest? Which was most consistent? In your notebook, write: 'In a real life-or-death situation - search and rescue, autonomous medical delivery - I would trust ___ because ___.'

What Just Happened

3Look at the class whiteboard scoreboard - all teams' times, all 3 modes. How many pairs had Collaboration win? Pure Human win? Pure AI win? Add a tally line to your notebook scoreboard underneath: 'Class results: Collab won __ / Human won __ / AI won __.'

4Find a pair where Pure AI won. Ask them: what was special about their prompt?

5Find a pair where Pure Human won. Ask: did they have prior coding experience?

The most interesting result is not who won. It is the SPREAD between Pure AI's best and worst times. AI is high variance. Humans are lower variance. Collaboration combines high ceiling with stability.

4. Class Data

Woven notebook: pull your data into a clean table. Write the trend you see in one sentence. If you cannot describe it in one sentence, you do not understand it yet.

Week 1 Synthesis

Mode	Class Best Time (sec)	Class Worst Time (sec)	DNF Count
Pure Human	fill	fill	fill
Pure AI	fill	fill	fill
Collab	fill	fill	fill

1Calculate the spread (worst minus best) for each mode. Which mode had the smallest spread? That is the most reliable mode.

In professional software engineering, this exact tradeoff drives team decisions: Pure AI is fast when it works but unreliable. Humans are reliable but slow. The mix is where careers live.

5. Wrap

Woven notebook: answer the reflection prompts in writing before you leave. Tomorrow's session starts where today's notebook ends.

Pathway: Robotics Engineer - Human-AI Collaboration

What is it Like to Work as a Robotics Engineer

Watch this video to picture yourself in this career 5 to 10 years from now. Real-world advice from someone who does this job day to day. Same human-AI tradeoffs you tested today.

ML / Robotics Engineer (Human-in-the-Loop Systems): What they do: design systems where humans and AI work together - approval workflows, AI tools that need expert audit, prompt engineering teams. Entry pathway: BS in CS, Data Science, or Cognitive Science. Cal State LA's BS in CS with the AI emphasis fits exactly. Salary band (Glassdoor LA 2024): entry 95,000 to 115,000. Mid-career 140,000 to 180,000. First step from where you sit today: read 'Human + AI = Better Decisions' free articles on MIT Sloan Review.

Reflection

1Reflection 1: Did your prediction about which mode would win match the result? Why or why not?

2Reflection 2: When in your life is collaboration faster than working alone?

3Reflection 3: Looking back at this week, what is one thing you can now do that you could not do on Monday?

Next week we trade 1-pound robots for 30-gram drones. The physics is different. The stakes are higher. Bring your notebooks - everything you learned this week applies.

Week 1 Complete: You spent four days teaching a robot to think with logic, conditionals, and pathfinding. You also went head-to-head with an AI and either won, lost, or proved that collaboration beats both. Stand up. Find your partner. Take a group photo. You finished Week 1. Group photo. Sign your notebook. See you Monday for Week 2 - drones.

I completed Week 1

Reflection answers in notebook

I am ready for drones

Built by Woven Learning & Technology✎ Edit

Day 5: First Flight - APEX 149 Pilot Training

Aeronautical Engineer Pathway - Manual Flight + Pilot Skills

1. Spark

Woven notebook: open your notebook now. Use it to capture every prediction, partner discussion, and question that comes up in this phase. Your notebook is the record of your thinking.

APEX 149: Drone Unboxing and Setup

Watch this short video to see why today's topic matters before we dive in. Woven Learning's own walkthrough of the APEX. Watch start to finish before you touch the drone.

Foundations - The Four Stick Inputs

Welcome back.

The Hook: In 1903 the Wright brothers flew 120 feet at Kitty Hawk in 12 seconds. They had spent 4 years studying birds and failing wind-tunnel tests. Their breakthrough was not lift - it was CONTROL. They built the first 3-axis control system: pitch, roll, yaw. Every drone you fly this summer uses those exact same 3 axes - plus a fourth: throttle. 122 years later, the framework has not changed. Today you become the pilot.

Your APEX controller has TWO joysticks. Memorize this map: LEFT STICK - Up/Down = THROTTLE (altitude). Push up to climb, push down to descend. - Left/Right = YAW (rotation). Push left to spin counter-clockwise, right to spin clockwise. RIGHT STICK - Up/Down = PITCH (forward/backward tilt). Push up to fly forward, down to fly backward. - Left/Right = ROLL (side-to-side slide). Push left to slide left, right to slide right. Small, gentle movements. Always.

1Talk to your partner: when an airplane banks to turn, which axis is it using? When a helicopter spins in place, which axis?

2Predict: if the throttle is at 50 percent and you let go of every other stick, what does the drone do?

I can name the four stick inputs (throttle, yaw, pitch, roll)

2. Lab

Woven notebook: keep your notebook open as you build. Record your hypothesis, every measurement and observation, and what surprised you. Your notebook is your lab record for today.

Safety Zone Briefing - READ ALOUD AS A GROUP: Clear Communication: shout 'Drone in course!' before you launch. Shout 'Pilot ready!' before you take a turn. One At A Time: only one drone flies the course at a time. Eyes On The Drone: always keep your drone in sight when flying. Crash Plan: if you lose control or are about to crash, push the LEFT STICK ALL THE WAY DOWN immediately. That cuts throttle and grounds the drone safely. No-Fly Zones: students waiting their turn sit on a designated bench. Drones never fly over the bench.

Materials per pair: 1 APEX 149 drone, 1 controller (with 2 fresh AAA batteries), 1 fully-charged drone battery, 1 smartphone with the Tspeed 7 app installed (only needed Day 12 onward), 1 set of propellers (4 props), eye protection, taped 3 m by 3 m flight zone, 3 hula hoops (or large rings), notebook.

Today's task with the APEX 149: connect the drone, pair the physical controller, and run your first hover - no code yet, just stick skills, like a real pilot's first flight. Code Here - APEX 149 Pilot Apps: Today you fly the APEX with the PHYSICAL CONTROLLER. You will pair the drone to the controller and use the joysticks. The phone app is NOT used today (the manual says drone is paired to ONE thing at a time - controller OR app, never both). On Day 12 you switch to the app for the FPV mission. For now, set the phone aside.

App for later (Day 12 onward): - iOS: Tspeed 7 - https://apps.apple.com/in/app/tspeed-7/id1575505851 - Android: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.apex.at149 - Chromebook / Windows: AT-66BL from Microsoft Store / Google Play - Or browser: https://echo.pitsco.com (Pitsco's web-based block coding for the same drone)

APEX 149 Coding Drone Tutorial - Setup and Propellers

Carefully watch this tutorial to learn the steps before you try them. APEX's official walkthrough. Watch the propeller install section closely - we install ours next.

Pre-Flight Checklist (Read Aloud)

Pre-Flight Inspection - DO THIS ON YOUR ACTUAL DRONE before every flight today (and every day this week). One partner reads each item out loud, the other partner physically checks it on the drone. Switch roles for the next inspection. Propellers (4 total - check each): - Spin freely, no chips or cracks on the leading edge - Prop nut snug (cannot wiggle the prop with a fingertip) - Mounted in the correct rotation (CW prop on CW position, CCW on CCW) Motors (4 total - spin each one with a finger, drone OFF): - Spins free and quiet, no grit or scrape - No lint, hair, or carpet fiber wrapped on the shaft Battery: - Flat (NOT puffy or bulging - if puffy, GROUND it and put in LiPo bag) - 3 of 3 green LED bars (full charge) - Velcro strap tight, battery does not shift when you wiggle the drone Frame + body: - No cracks on any of the 4 arms (especially at the joints) - All motor mount screws flush and tight - Antenna straight up, not bent or kinked - Camera lens clean (microfiber cloth ONLY, never your shirt) Controller: - 2 fresh AAA batteries seated correctly - Power LED solid green - Beep is clear and strong on power-up (weak/raspy = swap batteries) Bind check (last): - Drone status LED is FLASHING blue (means bound to controller) - If solid blue: re-bind by holding both joysticks to lower-right corner for 3 seconds Any GROUND-level item = do not fly. Any NOTE-level item = log it in your notebook and tell the instructor.

Step 1 - Pair Drone + Controller

1Insert 2 AAA batteries in the back of the controller. Slide the drone's battery onto the drone body. Place the drone on a flat surface.

2Press and hold the power button on the controller until it beeps and the power button light comes on.

3Press and hold the power button on the drone battery. Three green battery-level LEDs come on (full charge).

4PAIR: move BOTH joysticks to the LOWER-RIGHT corner at the same time and hold. The controller will beep. The blue LED on top of the drone goes from rapid flash to slow flash. Pairing is now done (one-time).

Step 2 - Arm + Take Off

5ARM: move LEFT joystick to LOWER-LEFT corner and RIGHT joystick to LOWER-RIGHT corner at the SAME TIME. Hold for 2 seconds. The motors begin to spin slowly. This is your armed state.

6TAKE OFF: release the joysticks and IMMEDIATELY press the Take Off button on the controller (within 2 seconds, while motors are still spinning slowly). The drone rises to about 1 meter and hovers.

7LAND: press the Take Off / Land button again to land automatically. The drone descends gently to the ground and shuts off all motors.

Step 3 - First Hover Drill

Hypothesis: how much will your APEX drift from its takeoff spot during a 10-second hover with no input on pitch or roll? Predict a number in cm in your notebook before flying.

8After takeoff, leave the joysticks in the middle for 10 seconds. The drone holds altitude (this is HOVER STATE). Measure how far it drifted from start. Record.

9Practice altitude: push LEFT joystick UP slowly (drone climbs) - release - drone holds new height. Pull DOWN slowly - drone descends - release - drone holds. Repeat 3 times.

10Practice yaw: push LEFT joystick LEFT slowly (drone spins counter-clockwise). Push RIGHT (clockwise). Re-center the drone facing forward.

11Practice forward/back: push RIGHT joystick UP (drone glides forward). Pull back (drone glides backward).

12Practice roll: push RIGHT joystick LEFT and RIGHT (drone slides side to side). Land.

Step 4 - Hoop Pass Drill

13Partner holds a hula hoop vertically at chest height. Take off, fly forward through the hoop, hover on the other side, return through the hoop, land. Two passes.

Trim Buttons - Use Them If The Drone Drifts: If the drone keeps shifting forward when you are not pushing the stick, press the BACKWARD trim arrow on the controller. If it drifts left, press RIGHT trim. The trim adjusts the drone's resting balance until you stop touching it. This is an actual flight-engineer skill. Real drones drift. Trim is how you fix it.

Crash protocol: if your drone is about to hit a wall or person, LEFT STICK ALL THE WAY DOWN immediately. Throttle = zero. Drone falls and powers off safely. Practice this reflex BEFORE you need it.

I paired controller + drone correctly

I armed and took off using the official sequence

I hovered for 10 seconds and recorded drift

I flew through a hula hoop forward and back

I used the trim buttons at least once

3. AI Check

Woven notebook: as the AI helps or fails, write down exactly what you fed it and what it gave back. The trail of prompts and outputs IS your data.

Why an AI Cannot Fly Your Drone Today

AI Prompt Template - Drone Physics: Copy and paste this exact prompt into Gemini (https://gemini.google.com) or Claude (https://claude.ai): 'Explain quadcopter pitch, roll, and yaw to a high school student. Use a real-world example for each.' Then ask follow-up: 'Why do quadcopters need 4 motors instead of 3?'

1Open Gemini or Claude. Ask: 'Can you remotely control my APEX 149 drone using my phone?' Read the answer.

2Now ask: 'What sensors and controls would an AI need access to in order to fly a drone autonomously?' Note the answer (camera, IMU, GPS, motor outputs, control loop).

3Ask: 'Why can a Tesla self-drive but my hobby drone cannot?' Listen for: SAFETY CERTIFICATION, REDUNDANT SENSORS, REGULATION, LIABILITY.

Today YOU were the controller. Next week you will write code that flies the drone for you. By Day 13, perception (camera) will trigger action (movement) in a closed loop. Step by step, you become a pilot. Then you become an autonomy engineer.

4. Class Data

Woven notebook: pull your data into a clean table. Write the trend you see in one sentence. If you cannot describe it in one sentence, you do not understand it yet.

Class Hover Drift Data

Hover Drift Across the Class (cm over 10 seconds)

Pair	Predicted drift	Actual drift	Difference
A
B
C
D

1What is the average drift? Which pair was closest to predicting reality?

Real drone engineers call this 'station-keeping' performance. A consumer drone hovers within 30 cm. A military drone hovers within 5 cm. You just measured your APEX. That number is your baseline for every test this week.

5. Wrap

Woven notebook: answer the reflection prompts in writing before you leave. Tomorrow's session starts where today's notebook ends.

Pathway: Aeronautical Engineer + Drone Pilot

9 Growing Jobs for Drone Pilots in 2025

Check out this video to see a real professional in this role. From the Drone Nerds channel. Real entry-level paths people are taking right now.

Aeronautical Engineer / Commercial Drone Pilot: What they do: design, test, and operate aircraft. With an FAA Part 107 certification (a written test you can take at age 16), you can be a paid commercial drone pilot. Entry pathway: BS Aerospace or Mechanical Engineering for the engineer track (Cal State LA + Cal Poly Pomona). For the pilot track: 14-week prep + Part 107 test, then real-world hours flying for surveying, real estate, film, search-and-rescue. Salary band (BLS LA 2024): aerospace engineer entry 84,000 to 102,000. Commercial drone pilot entry 50,000 to 75,000 (often hourly, 50 to 150 per hour for specialty work). First step from where you sit today: study for the Part 107 written test. Practice tests are free online.

Spotlight: Ernest Levert: Levert (1954 to present) is an aerospace engineer at Lockheed Martin who pioneered ROBOTIC WELDING for the International Space Station and NASA's Space Shuttles. He proved robots could do precision construction at scale - exactly the kind of automation that lets your APEX exist as an affordable kit today. His path: rural Mississippi to Tennessee Tech to Lockheed. Underrepresented in his industry, he led teams that built billion-dollar systems. The robot you flew today exists because his generation made the manufacturing possible.

Reflection

1Reflection 1: what surprised you about flying your APEX?

2Reflection 2: when have you trusted a checklist before doing something risky?

3Reflection 3: tomorrow we add weight. What do you think will happen?

I completed Day 5

I logged my drift number

My drone is back in the charging dock

Built by Woven Learning & Technology✎ Edit

Day 6: The Weight-to-Lift Inquiry

Aeronautical Engineer Pathway - Manual Flight Testing

1. Spark

Woven notebook: open your notebook now. Use it to capture every prediction, partner discussion, and question that comes up in this phase. Your notebook is the record of your thinking.

How Does A Wing Actually Work? (Veritasium)

Carefully view this video to ground today's hook in a real example. Veritasium digs into the actual physics of how wings generate lift - then debunks the simplified explanation you may have heard in textbooks. Watch the full video.

Foundations - The Equation

Yesterday you connected the drone, paired the controller, and ran your first hover. Today you measure how much weight it can carry. Today you fly. Before you do, you ask the question that drives every aeronautical engineering team on earth: how much can it lift, and how heavy is it? That ratio decides everything.

The Hook: A Boeing 747 weighs 412,000 pounds empty. Fully loaded with fuel, cargo, and passengers it weighs 875,000 pounds. To lift it, the four engines produce 252,000 pounds of THRUST - and the wings convert it to over 1 MILLION pounds of LIFT. Lift-to-weight ratio: 1.14. Just enough to fly. Your APEX 149 weighs around 100 grams. With max throttle, the four motors produce enough lift to climb fast even with extra weight. Today you measure exactly how much weight your APEX can carry before climb performance breaks down.

Lift = total upward force from spinning propellers (measured in grams or Newtons). Weight = mass times gravity (just the mass in grams works for our purpose). Lift-to-Weight Ratio = Lift / Weight. If ratio < 1: drone cannot leave the ground. If ratio = 1: drone hovers, cannot climb. If ratio > 1: drone climbs. Higher ratio = faster climb.

1Predict: what happens to your APEX 149's lift-to-weight ratio if you tape a 5-gram weight to it?

I understand the lift-to-weight equation

2. Lab

Woven notebook: keep your notebook open as you build. Record your hypothesis, every measurement and observation, and what surprised you. Your notebook is your lab record for today.

Safety Refresher: eyewear ON. Stay in your taped flight zone. If anything goes wrong - LEFT STICK ALL THE WAY DOWN. Battery low warning means LAND IMMEDIATELY.

Materials per pair: APEX 149 + controller + phone with Tspeed 7, fresh fully-charged battery, kitchen scale (0.1 g resolution), 5 paper clips (each weighs about 1 gram), small piece of painters tape, stopwatch, eyewear, taped 3 m by 3 m flight zone, notebook.

Drone Setup - Same as Day 5: Pair the controller with the drone (both joysticks to lower-right corner, hold). Phone app NOT needed today (still using physical controller). If you forgot the pairing sequence: see Day 5's notebook page or ask your instructor for a quick refresh.

The Question

How does adding weight affect your drone's ability to climb? Today you make TWO predictions of your drone's lift threshold - your own gut, and an engineer's calculator - then run real flight trials to see who was closest.

1Weigh your drone (no payload) on the kitchen scale. Record the empty mass in grams. (Most APEX 149s weigh between 28-32g.)

Your Hypothesis - Your Gut Prediction

2In your notebook, write your GUT prediction: at what payload (in paper clips, 1g each) do you think your drone will fail to climb at full throttle? Hint: light drones typically lift 25-50% of their own weight. Yours weighs ~30g. Write a number + one sentence of reasoning.

The Engineer's Tool - Drone Lift Calculator

Why this app: real engineers do not just guess - they MODEL. The Drone Lift Calculator (below) takes your drone's mass, payload, motor count, and thrust per motor, and predicts whether the drone will HOVER, BARELY HOVER, or be GROUNDED. Use it to make your second prediction (the calculator's prediction) before you fly. After your real trials, you will compare gut vs calculator vs reality.

3Open the calculator (above). Enter your drone's empty mass from your weigh-in. Set Payload mass to 0g. Note the lift-to-weight ratio - this is your no-payload baseline.

4Now slide Payload mass up in 1g steps: 1g, 2g, 3g, 4g, 5g. At what payload does the status flip from HOVER ✅ to BARELY HOVER? At what payload does it flip to GROUNDED ❌? Record both numbers in your notebook as the CALCULATOR's PREDICTION.

5Compare your two predictions: how close was your GUT prediction to the CALCULATOR's prediction? Off by 1g? 2g? Same number? Write the comparison in your notebook before you fly.

The Build - Real Climb Test

6Predict: how high (in body lengths) can your drone climb in 5 seconds at full throttle with NO payload?

7Trial 0 (baseline, no payload): on the controller, push the LEFT STICK to FULL throttle for 5 seconds. Watch how high the drone climbs. Estimate climb height in body lengths (1 body length is roughly 12 cm).

8Tape 1 paper clip (about 1 gram) to the top of the drone, dead center. Reweigh. Repeat the climb test. Record.

9Repeat with 2 paperclips. Then 3. Then 4. Each trial: weigh first, fly second, record climb height.

10Compare ALL THREE: at what REAL payload did your drone fail to climb? How close was your GUT prediction? How close was the CALCULATOR's prediction? If they all differ, write a 1-sentence hypothesis - what physics is the model missing? (Battery sag? Motor wear? Prop angle?)

11Build a data table: Trial, Total Mass (g), Climb Height (body lengths in 5 sec), Notes.

If the drone cannot leave the ground with the added weight, that is real data. Record it as 'failed to lift' and remove a clip. The line where lift fails is your drone's ceiling.

I ran 5 climb trials at increasing mass

I have a complete data table

3. AI Check

Woven notebook: as the AI helps or fails, write down exactly what you fed it and what it gave back. The trail of prompts and outputs IS your data.

AI Predicts the Curve

1Open Gemini. Type: 'I have a small quadcopter that weighs about 100 grams empty. With each 1-gram paperclip I add as payload, what general trend should I expect for climb height in 5 seconds at full throttle?'

2Write the AI's predicted trend in your notebook (linear? curved? at what mass does it predict failure?).

3Compare to your actual data. Was the AI's general trend right? Was its failure-point prediction right?

4Ask: 'What real-world variables make actual climb performance worse than a model predicts?' Note: battery age, motor wear, propeller damage, room air currents.

The AI is great at directional reasoning ('more weight equals less climb') but bad at exact numbers without your drone's spec sheet. Real engineers always test.

4. Class Data

Woven notebook: pull your data into a clean table. Write the trend you see in one sentence. If you cannot describe it in one sentence, you do not understand it yet.

Class Lift Curve

Class Climb Performance vs Payload

Pair	Empty mass	1g	2g	3g	Failure point
A
B
C
D

1Sketch a graph: payload mass on X, climb height on Y. Draw your data and the class average. What is the shape?

Engineers call this the THRUST CURVE. Every aircraft has one. Cargo plane operators use it to decide max payload. You just measured yours.

5. Wrap

Woven notebook: answer the reflection prompts in writing before you leave. Tomorrow's session starts where today's notebook ends.

Pathway: Flight Test Engineer

What Does an Aerospace Engineer Do?

Watch this video to see what a real day in this career actually looks like. A NASA aerospace engineer walks through her day - rockets, airplanes, simulations, lab work.

Flight Test Engineer: What they do: design and run controlled experiments on aircraft and drones to verify they fly the way the math says. Entry pathway: BS Aerospace or Mechanical Engineering. Cal State LA + Cal Poly transfer track is the local route. Salary band (BLS LA 2024): entry 88,000 to 105,000. Mid-career 125,000 to 165,000. First step from where you sit today: AIAA student chapter at Cal State LA, plus DIY drone projects you can document in a portfolio.

Spotlight: Lonnie Johnson: Johnson (1949 to present) is famous for inventing the Super Soaker, but he is also a NASA aerospace engineer. He spent his career designing power systems for the Galileo mission to Jupiter and the Cassini mission to Saturn - keeping robotic explorers running for years in deep space. In high school, he built a remote-controlled robot named Linex from junkyard scraps. The same DIY spirit you used to tape a paperclip to your drone is what got him to NASA.

Reflection

1Reflection 1: what did watching your drone struggle to lift feel like vs what the data showed?

2Reflection 2: when did your prediction match reality? When did it not?

3Reflection 3: a 1-gram paper clip changed your drone. What other tiny changes have huge effects in the world?

I flew my first weight-to-lift trial

I have a thrust curve sketched

Built by Woven Learning & Technology✎ Edit

Day 7: Payload Variable Testing

Aeronautical Engineer Pathway - Controlled Variable Experiments

1. Spark

Woven notebook: open your notebook now. Use it to capture every prediction, partner discussion, and question that comes up in this phase. Your notebook is the record of your thinking.

The Physics of Drones

Watch the video to set up today's thinking - this is the real-world story behind the lab. How payload affects flight. We will measure this on our drones today.

Foundations - Variables

Yesterday you measured how mass affects climb. Today you ask the harder question: what about WHERE you put the mass? A drone with the weight on the front behaves nothing like one with weight on the back.

The Hook: A cargo plane carrying 100,000 pounds of cargo cannot just stack it anywhere. If the load shifts to the back, the plane noses up and stalls. If it shifts forward, it dives. There is a tiny zone called the CENTER OF GRAVITY where the plane is balanced. Move out of it by 6 inches and the plane crashes. Your APEX 149 has the same center of gravity rule, scaled down.

INDEPENDENT variable: the one thing you change. DEPENDENT variable: what you measure as a result. CONTROLLED variables: everything you keep the same. Today's experiment: Independent: position of payload (front, back, center). Dependent: hover stability (drift in cm over 10 seconds). Controlled: payload mass, battery state, takeoff height, room conditions.

1Predict: where will weight cause the drone to drift the most? Front, back, or sides?

I can name the 3 types of variables

2. Lab

Woven notebook: keep your notebook open as you build. Record your hypothesis, every measurement and observation, and what surprised you. Your notebook is your lab record for today.

Materials per pair: APEX 149 + controller + phone with Tspeed 7, fresh battery, kitchen scale, 1 paper clip (2 g), painters tape, ruler, taped 3 m by 3 m flight zone with cm grid drawn on paper at center, eyewear, notebook. Fresh batteries at the charging station.

Today's task with Pitsco Echo: add measured payload weights to the drone, then test how each weight changes hover stability and drift. Same Echo app you will fly autonomously starting Day 10 - today you fly manually with payload. Code Here - Pitsco Echo (block coding for APEX): Web app: https://echo.pitsco.com - open it in Google Chrome or Microsoft Edge on a laptop or Chromebook. It will NOT connect in Safari or on an iPad/tablet, and there is no account or sign-in - the site is 100% web-based. Before you press Connect: (1) power the controller OFF - the drone will not accept code from the browser while it is still paired to its controller; (2) power-cycle the drone so it is ready to pair; (3) turn ON your laptop's Bluetooth. Echo connects to the drone over the LAPTOP's Bluetooth - not the phone. Now click CONNECT on echo.pitsco.com and pick your drone in the Bluetooth pop-up that appears. (For this workshop you code in the browser, not on the phone. The Tspeed 7 phone app is used later only for first-person camera flight over WiFi, so you do not need it for these autonomous missions.) Drag blocks from the left palette into the canvas. Click RUN. The drone flies your code. The OFF switch on the drone or controller is your kill button.

APEX 149 Coding Drone Tutorial (First Time Using Echo)

Carefully watch this tutorial to learn the Pitsco Echo block-coding interface BEFORE you build your first program. This is the same Echo you will use Days 7-11 - learn the layout (block palette, canvas, run button, drone connection) once and you're set for the week.

The Hypothesis

1Sketch the drone top-down with X/Y axes. Mark 4 payload positions: Front (+Y), Back (-Y), Left (-X), Right (+X). Predict drift direction for each.

The Build - Hover Stability Test

2Open the calculator (above). Enter your drone's mass + 2g payload. Confirm the status reads HOVER ✅. This proves your drone CAN lift today's payload - so any drift you see in the trials below is from POSITION, not from being underpowered.

3Tape paper clip on FRONT of drone. Run program: Takeoff (0.8 m) → Wait 10 s → Land. Watch where the drone drifts. After landing, measure how far from center it ended in cm. Record.

4Move clip to BACK. Repeat. Record drift distance and direction.

5Move clip to LEFT side. Repeat.

6Move clip to RIGHT side. Repeat.

7Bonus: tape clip dead CENTER (on top of flight controller). Repeat. This is your 'control' - drift should be smallest.

8With 4 drift readings in hand, look back at the calculator's HOVER ✅ confirmation from earlier. Lift was never the problem - so 100% of today's drift is from offset weight (torque). The further the payload sits from center, the harder the drone fights to stay level. Write that takeaway in your notebook before moving on.

9Build a data table: Position, Drift Distance (cm), Drift Direction.

Use a fresh battery for each trial. A weak battery drifts on its own. That contaminates your data.

I tested 4 positions

I used a fresh battery each time

3. AI Check

Woven notebook: as the AI helps or fails, write down exactly what you fed it and what it gave back. The trail of prompts and outputs IS your data.

Cheat Sheet - Why Offset Weight Causes Drift: TORQUE = force x distance from center. A 1-gram clip taped 5 cm forward of center creates a forward-tipping torque on the drone. The flight controller compensates by spinning the back motors faster than the front motors. This is called THRUST DIFFERENTIAL. CONTROL AUTHORITY = how much extra thrust the motors have available to counteract torque. Once payload offset exceeds control authority, the drone cannot correct fast enough and drifts. For your APEX 149: each motor can produce up to 30 g of thrust. With 4 motors, total ceiling is 120 g. Subtract the drone's own 31 g weight. That leaves 89 g of margin to redirect toward correcting offset payloads.

Why Does Offset Weight Drift?

1Open Gemini. Type: 'On a quadcopter, why does adding weight to the front cause the drone to drift forward instead of just sinking?'

2Read the AI's explanation. Look for the words 'torque' and 'thrust differential.' Write the AI's one-sentence answer in your notebook.

3Ask: 'What is the maximum offset payload my APEX 149 can handle before it cannot stabilize?' The AI will probably guess - record its number and compare to your data.

Engineers call this 'control authority' - how much corrective torque the motors have available. Once payload offset exceeds control authority, the drone is dead in the air.

4. Class Data

Woven notebook: pull your data into a clean table. Write the trend you see in one sentence. If you cannot describe it in one sentence, you do not understand it yet.

Class Data

Position	Your Drift (cm)	Class Avg Drift (cm)
Front	fill	fill
Back	fill	fill
Left	fill	fill
Right	fill	fill
Center	fill	fill

1Which position had the smallest drift? Which had the largest? Why?

This is exactly the kind of data delivery-drone engineers gather to certify a payload bay design.

5. Wrap

Woven notebook: answer the reflection prompts in writing before you leave. Tomorrow's session starts where today's notebook ends.

Pathway: Aeronautical Engineer - Controlled Experiments

Aerospace Engineers Career Video

Check out this video to see a real professional in this role. Day-in-the-life of aerospace engineers across companies. Same controlled-experiment work you ran today.

Drone Test Engineer (Payload + Stability): What they do: design payload bays, certify drones to carry medical supplies, packages, cameras. Real LA employers: Skydio, Zipline, Amazon Prime Air. Entry pathway: BS Aerospace or Mechanical Engineering. Lots of internships at SoCal startups for sophomore-junior students. Salary band (Glassdoor LA 2024): entry 92,000 to 110,000. Mid-career 130,000 to 170,000. First step from where you sit today: build and document your APEX 149 work in a personal portfolio. Real employers want to see real builds.

Reflection

1Reflection 1: What surprised you about the data?

2Reflection 2: Where in your life is one variable secretly controlling everything else?

3Reflection 3: If you were certifying a delivery drone for medication transport, where would you place the payload?

I completed Day 7

I designed a controlled experiment

Built by Woven Learning & Technology✎ Edit

Day 8: Battery Drain and Flight Endurance

Aeronautical Engineer Pathway - Endurance Modeling

1. Spark

Woven notebook: open your notebook now. Use it to capture every prediction, partner discussion, and question that comes up in this phase. Your notebook is the record of your thinking.

How Do Drones Really Fly?

Watch this short video to see why today's topic matters before we dive in. A thorough look at quadcopter aerodynamics. Useful background for your battery experiment.

Foundations - Battery Math

Lift, weight, and stability all depend on one thing: battery. A drone with a dead battery is a brick. Today you measure exactly how long YOUR drone can fly and what makes it shorter.

The Hook: Amazon Prime Air can only deliver to homes within 7.5 miles of their warehouse. Why? Battery. Each delivery drone has a max round-trip range based on battery capacity, payload weight, and weather. If they want to deliver further, they need a heavier battery, which means less payload, which is the whole problem. This is the engineering tradeoff at the heart of every electric flying machine on earth.

Foundations - Battery Math: Capacity = how much energy is stored (mAh = milliamp hours) Draw = how fast the motors use it (mA at hover) Flight Time (min) = Capacity / (Draw / 60) Your APEX 149 battery is small. Its real-world flight time is 9 to 10 minutes per fully-charged battery on a fresh charge - longer if you fly gently, shorter if you fly hard. Today you measure your APEX's actual hover time and compare it to the spec sheet.

1Predict: how many minutes can your drone hover before the low-battery warning?

I understand the battery flight-time equation

2. Lab

Woven notebook: keep your notebook open as you build. Record your hypothesis, every measurement and observation, and what surprised you. Your notebook is your lab record for today.

Materials per pair: APEX 149 + controller + phone with Tspeed 7, FRESH fully-charged battery (verify at the charging station), spare battery (also fresh), stopwatch, paper clips for the payload trial, eyewear, taped flight zone, notebook.

Today's task with Pitsco Echo: measure how long your drone hovers across 4 battery charge levels (100%, 75%, 50%, 25%) so you can build a battery-life model and predict mission duration. Code Here - Pitsco Echo (block coding for APEX): Web app: https://echo.pitsco.com - open it in Google Chrome or Microsoft Edge on a laptop or Chromebook. It will NOT connect in Safari or on an iPad/tablet, and there is no account or sign-in - the site is 100% web-based. Before you press Connect: (1) power the controller OFF - the drone will not accept code from the browser while it is still paired to its controller; (2) power-cycle the drone so it is ready to pair; (3) turn ON your laptop's Bluetooth. Echo connects to the drone over the LAPTOP's Bluetooth - not the phone. Now click CONNECT on echo.pitsco.com and pick your drone in the Bluetooth pop-up that appears. (For this workshop you code in the browser, not on the phone. The Tspeed 7 phone app is used later only for first-person camera flight over WiFi, so you do not need it for these autonomous missions.) Drag blocks from the left palette into the canvas. Click RUN. The drone flies your code. The OFF switch on the drone or controller is your kill button.

The Hypothesis

1Predict: how long will your drone hover with NO payload? How long with a 2-gram payload?

The Build - Endurance Test

2Open the Drone Battery Predictor (above). Enter your drone's mass + 0g payload. The app gives you a predicted hover time at full charge. Record this as your NO-PAYLOAD prediction.

3Now enter the same drone mass + 2g payload. Note how predicted hover time drops. Record the percent difference - that's your PREDICTED penalty for adding 2g.

4Trial 1 (no payload): Build program: Takeoff (1 m) → Wait 600 s (10 min) → Land. Run. Start stopwatch at takeoff. Watch for auto-land or low-battery warning. Stop stopwatch when drone lands. Record total hover time.

5Swap to a fresh fully charged battery. Verify with the charging station LED.

6Trial 2 (with 2-gram payload taped to center): repeat the program. Time it. Record.

7Calculate the percent change in flight time when you added 2 grams. Was the drop bigger or smaller than you predicted?

Do NOT keep flying after the auto-land. Lithium batteries below 3.0 V can fail catastrophically. The drone protects itself; do not override.

I ran two endurance trials

I used fresh batteries

3. AI Check

Woven notebook: as the AI helps or fails, write down exactly what you fed it and what it gave back. The trail of prompts and outputs IS your data.

AI Builds the Endurance Model

1Open Gemini. Type: 'For a APEX 149 with a 250 mAh battery and 1500 mA hover draw, build a table of expected hover time at payloads of 0, 1, 2, 3, and 5 grams. Show your assumptions.'

2Write the AI's predicted times next to your two actual data points. Does its model match the trend?

3Ask: 'What real-world factors would make actual flight time SHORTER than your prediction?' Read the answer.

Real factors: battery age, ambient temperature, propeller wear, motor calibration. The model is the ceiling. Reality is always under it.

4. Class Data

Woven notebook: pull your data into a clean table. Write the trend you see in one sentence. If you cannot describe it in one sentence, you do not understand it yet.

Class Endurance Data

Payload (g)	Your Time (min:sec)	Class Avg (min:sec)	AI Prediction
0	fill	fill	fill
2	fill	fill	fill

1Calculate percent error between AI prediction and class average for each payload. Was the AI optimistic or pessimistic?

Real engineers always assume their drone will fly LESS than the spec sheet says. Plan for the worst case.

5. Wrap

Woven notebook: answer the reflection prompts in writing before you leave. Tomorrow's session starts where today's notebook ends.

Pathway: Aeronautical Engineer - Endurance Modeling

Energy Engineers Career Video

Check out this video to see a real professional in this role. Engineers who design battery + propulsion systems for everything that moves. The endurance math you did today.

Battery / Propulsion Engineer: What they do: design and certify the battery + motor combination on every electric vehicle, drone, and aircraft. Entry pathway: BS Electrical or Mechanical Engineering. Cal State LA EE program is a direct route. Internships at SpaceX, Joby, Archer, Lucid Motors, and Tesla all hire LA-area students. Salary band (Glassdoor LA 2024): entry 95,000 to 115,000. Mid-career 135,000 to 175,000. First step from where you sit today: take Cal State LA's free Saturday Engineering Workshops, sophomore year and up.

Reflection

1Reflection 1: How does the battery limit affect what kinds of drones can exist?

2Reflection 2: When have you 'run out of energy' on a project before finishing? What did you do?

3Reflection 3: If you had to design a delivery drone for medical supplies in LA, what is the FIRST tradeoff you would make: range or payload?

I completed Day 8

I have an endurance model

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Day 9: Delivery Mission - Lift-to-Weight Synthesis

Aeronautical Engineer Pathway - Synthesis Day

1. Spark

Woven notebook: open your notebook now. Use it to capture every prediction, partner discussion, and question that comes up in this phase. Your notebook is the record of your thinking.

Three days ago you weighed the drone. Two days ago you tested payload position. Yesterday you measured battery endurance. Today you put all three together in a delivery mission.

How Wings Generate Lift (Recap)

Watch this short recap to bring back the key idea. Same Veritasium explainer you saw on Day 6 - this time keep an eye on how lift scales with weight, since today is the synthesis flight where lift-vs-weight is the whole game.

Foundations - Synthesis

Four days of data. Today you put it together. You will design YOUR drone's optimal flight profile - the payload it can carry the longest distance most stably.

The Hook: NASA's Ingenuity helicopter on Mars weighed 1.8 kg in Mars gravity (about 4 lbs back home). Mars atmosphere is 1 percent of Earth's, which means propellers have to spin 5 TIMES faster to generate any lift. Ingenuity barely had a lift-to-weight ratio above 1. NASA engineers called it 'flying through soup with cardboard wings.' It flew 72 times. Sometimes the math says NO. Engineers find a way.

Today combines: Lift-to-weight (Day 6) Payload position (Day 7) Battery endurance (Day 8) Your question: given a 2-gram package, what is the BEST flight profile (route, position, speed) to deliver it across your flight zone in the shortest time without crashing?

1Predict: which factor will dominate today - weight, position, or battery? Write your guess.

I understand today is synthesis of Days 5-8

2. Lab

Woven notebook: keep your notebook open as you build. Record your hypothesis, every measurement and observation, and what surprised you. Your notebook is your lab record for today.

Materials per pair: APEX 149 + controller + phone with Tspeed 7, fresh battery, 2-gram payload (1 paperclip on a tiny tape pad), stopwatch, taped 3 m by 3 m flight zone with Start corner and Goal corner marked, eyewear, notebook. Whiteboard scoreboard at the front.

Today's task with Pitsco Echo: combine everything from this week (lift + position + battery) into ONE delivery mission - take off, carry payload across the room, drop it, return home. Code Here - Pitsco Echo (block coding for APEX): Web app: https://echo.pitsco.com - open it in Google Chrome or Microsoft Edge on a laptop or Chromebook. It will NOT connect in Safari or on an iPad/tablet, and there is no account or sign-in - the site is 100% web-based. Before you press Connect: (1) power the controller OFF - the drone will not accept code from the browser while it is still paired to its controller; (2) power-cycle the drone so it is ready to pair; (3) turn ON your laptop's Bluetooth. Echo connects to the drone over the LAPTOP's Bluetooth - not the phone. Now click CONNECT on echo.pitsco.com and pick your drone in the Bluetooth pop-up that appears. (For this workshop you code in the browser, not on the phone. The Tspeed 7 phone app is used later only for first-person camera flight over WiFi, so you do not need it for these autonomous missions.) Drag blocks from the left palette into the canvas. Click RUN. The drone flies your code. The OFF switch on the drone or controller is your kill button.

The Hypothesis

1Sketch your delivery mission in your notebook: start corner, goal corner, payload position on drone. Predict your delivery time.

The Build - Delivery Mission

2Open the Synthesis calculator (above). Enter your full mission setup: drone mass + 2g payload + a battery level you'll START at (say 80%). The app shows whether the drone can complete this mission. Status = HOVER ✅ means GO; status = BARELY HOVER means risky. Record the prediction.

3In Pitsco Echo, build: Takeoff → Fly Forward (3 m) → Land at Goal → Wait 2 s → Takeoff → Fly Backward (3 m) → Land at Start.

4Run with 2g payload taped to CENTER. Time the round trip. Record.

5Iterate: try the same mission with payload OFFSET to one side. Does it fly straighter or drift?

6Final attempt: optimize speed (slower turns, faster straights). Record best round-trip time.

7Compare your real round-trip time to the calculator's PREDICTION. Did the drone complete the mission as predicted? If status was BARELY HOVER and the drone made it - lucky. If status was HOVER ✅ but the drone crashed - what unmodeled factor caused the failure? (Wind? Pilot error? Battery sag mid-flight?)

Set up your team's DELIVERY SCOREBOARD now (different metric than Week 1's Showdown Scoreboard). Turn to a fresh page in your Woven notebook. Draw a 5-column table with these headers: Team | Total mass (g) | Payload position (center / offset) | Round-trip time (s) | Crash? (Y/N). Add a row for your team. The class also tracks all teams on the whiteboard - your notebook is your permanent record.

8Post your team's best round-trip time and mass on BOTH the class whiteboard AND your notebook DELIVERY SCOREBOARD. Then add the other teams' times to your notebook scoreboard as they post. End-of-class question: which team had the fastest delivery? What did they do differently?

Crashes count as DNF. A failed delivery is a failed mission - real Amazon drones have to land safely or it does not count.

I completed at least one full delivery mission

I optimized payload position

3. AI Check

Woven notebook: as the AI helps or fails, write down exactly what you fed it and what it gave back. The trail of prompts and outputs IS your data.

AI Designs the Mission

1Open Gemini. Type: 'Design an optimal APEX 149 delivery mission: 2-gram payload, 3-meter round trip, fresh battery. Specify takeoff height, speed, and payload position. Show your reasoning.'

2Compare the AI's mission to yours. Did it pick the same speed? Same payload position? Same takeoff height?

3Run the AI's mission. Time it. Did it beat your best?

In real engineering, the AI is a starting point. Engineers tweak based on physical reality the AI does not know about - like the rough texture of the floor or the airflow from the AC vent.

4. Class Data

Woven notebook: pull your data into a clean table. Write the trend you see in one sentence. If you cannot describe it in one sentence, you do not understand it yet.

Class Mission Times

Pair	Round-Trip Time (sec)	Crashes	Payload Position
Yours	fill	fill	fill
Class Best	fill	fill	fill

1What did the class winner do that you did not? Write one sentence.

This kind of head-to-head competitive testing is exactly how Amazon, Zipline, and Skydio refine their delivery drones. Iteration beats invention.

5. Wrap

Woven notebook: answer the reflection prompts in writing before you leave. Tomorrow's session starts where today's notebook ends.

Pathway: Aeronautical Engineer - Synthesis

Day at Work: Roboticist

Check out this video to see a real professional in this role. Dr. Marek Michalowski builds interactive robots. Mission design is exactly his daily work.

Mission Design Engineer: What they do: combine all the subsystems (battery, structure, control, payload) into a working aircraft mission. Half engineer, half project manager. Entry pathway: BS Aerospace or Mechanical Engineering with systems-engineering electives. Cal State LA + Cal Poly Pomona transfer. Salary band (BLS LA 2024): entry 90,000 to 110,000. Mid-career 130,000 to 175,000. First step: design and document a complete mission for a personal drone build, post it to GitHub or YouTube.

Reflection

1Reflection 1: Which day this week taught you the most? Why?

2Reflection 2: When have you combined separate skills into one final product?

3Reflection 3: Next week we make the drone fly itself. What concerns you about autonomous flight?

Week 2 Complete - pilots (Manual Flight): Five days of manual flight, payload tests, battery math, and lift-to-weight curves. You measured what flies and what doesn't with your own hands. Stand up. Read your single biggest data point out loud to the class. You finished Week 2. Group photo. Sign your notebook. See you next session.

I completed Week 2

I designed a delivery mission

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Day 10: Echo Coding - Square and L-Shape Patterns

Autonomous Systems Engineer Pathway - First Block-Coded Flight

1. Spark

Woven notebook: open your notebook now. Use it to capture every prediction, partner discussion, and question that comes up in this phase. Your notebook is the record of your thinking.

APEX 149 Coding Drone Tutorial

Carefully watch this tutorial to learn the steps before you try them. APEX's official walkthrough of the Pitsco Echo block coding environment. Watch this before you write your first program.

Foundations - Block Coding for Flight

Welcome back, pilot. Yesterday you flew the APEX with your hands on the sticks. Today the drone flies itself - because of the code you write.

The Hook: A Waymo self-driving car has 29 cameras, 6 radars, 5 lidars, and 4 GPS antennas. It generates 4 GIGABYTES of sensor data every minute it drives. All of that data feeds into ONE question: 'What should I do in the next 100 milliseconds?' Your APEX 149 is simpler. But the same idea: a program decides what the drone does, instead of you. Today you write that program.

MISSION BRIEFING - Apex Drone Navigator Challenge, Echo Edition: Welcome, drone pilots and coders. Your mission across Days 10 and 11: use block coding at https://echo.pitsco.com to program your APEX 149 to fly a pattern. Day 10: basic 'square-shaped' flight + L-shape pattern. Day 11: more complex designs using LOOPS and FUNCTIONS - a looped square, a zigzag, and a distance-increment mission where each leg gets longer. If your drone does not spin exactly 90 degrees on a turn block, adjust the time or speed parameter on the spin block. That tweaking IS the engineering.

Pitsco Echo is the block-coding tool for the APEX 149. You drag blocks like 'Take Off', 'Forward', 'Left 90 degrees', 'Land' into a stack. The drone runs them in order. Key blocks you will use today: - TAKE OFF (lifts to default hover height) - FORWARD (distance in inches) - TURN LEFT / TURN RIGHT (degrees) - LAND The whole program is the recipe for the flight.

1Talk to your partner: if you wanted the APEX to fly a perfect square, what blocks (in what order) would you need?

2Predict: if your drone needs to fly a 60 cm square at full throttle, will you need the same number of blocks as a 30 cm square?

I can name 4 Echo block types

2. Lab

Woven notebook: keep your notebook open as you build. Record your hypothesis, every measurement and observation, and what surprised you. Your notebook is your lab record for today.

Safety: eyewear ON. Stay in the taped flight zone. Crash protocol still applies even with autonomous code - keep the controller close as a manual override. The OFF button on the drone or controller stops everything.

Materials per pair: APEX 149 + controller + laptop or tablet with https://echo.pitsco.com open in Chrome, fresh battery, painters tape (mark a Start spot on the floor), ruler, eyewear, taped 3 m by 3 m flight zone, notebook. Charging station at instructor table.

Is today Friday? No computer lab on Fridays, and Echo only connects on a laptop or Chromebook in Chrome or Edge - never a phone or tablet. So code it on paper today: write the full block sequence by hand, predict the flight, then enter and fly it on the next computer day.

Friday Plan B - no computer lab

1Friday version: write the square program by hand. In your notebook, list the exact block stack in order - Take Off, Forward 24 in, Turn Left 90, and so on around all four sides, then Land. This is your code, just on paper.

2Friday version: predict the flight. Sketch the square with corners A, B, C, D. Mark the distance and turn angle on every leg. Write where you think it lands relative to Start, and the one parameter you would tweak first.

3Friday version: write the L-shape program. Below the square, write the block stack for the L-shape - Take Off, Forward 36 in, Turn, Forward, Land. Predict the landing corner.

4Next computer day: enter it and fly it. Type your banked block stacks into echo.pitsco.com, run them, and measure the real gap against your prediction. How close was your paper code to the real flight?

Today's task with Pitsco Echo: switch from manual flight to AUTONOMOUS code. You write the block code, hit run, and the drone flies itself. Today's first autonomous mission: a square pattern. Code Here - Pitsco Echo (block coding for APEX): Web app: https://echo.pitsco.com - open it in Google Chrome or Microsoft Edge on a laptop or Chromebook. It will NOT connect in Safari or on an iPad/tablet, and there is no account or sign-in - the site is 100% web-based. Before you press Connect: (1) power the controller OFF - the drone will not accept code from the browser while it is still paired to its controller; (2) power-cycle the drone so it is ready to pair; (3) turn ON your laptop's Bluetooth. Echo connects to the drone over the LAPTOP's Bluetooth - not the phone. Now click CONNECT on echo.pitsco.com and pick your drone in the Bluetooth pop-up that appears. (For this workshop you code in the browser, not on the phone. The Tspeed 7 phone app is used later only for first-person camera flight over WiFi, so you do not need it for these autonomous missions.) Drag blocks from the left palette into the canvas. Click RUN. The drone flies your code. The OFF switch on the drone or controller is your kill button.

APEX 149 Coding Drone Tutorial

Carefully watch this tutorial to learn the steps before you try them. APEX's official walkthrough of the Pitsco Echo block coding environment. Watch this before you write your first program.

The Hypothesis

5Sketch the square pattern in your notebook. Mark the corners A, B, C, D. Predict: how many blocks total will your program need (Take Off + 4 Forwards + 4 Turns + Land = 10 blocks)?

The Build - Square Pattern

6Open https://echo.pitsco.com in Google Chrome or Microsoft Edge on your laptop (not Safari, not an iPad). There is no sign-in. Turn ON the laptop's Bluetooth, make sure the drone's controller is powered OFF, then click CONNECT and pick your drone from the Bluetooth pop-up.

7Drag the blocks for a square in this order: Take Off then Forward 24 inches then Turn Right 90 then Forward 24 inches then Turn Right 90 then Forward 24 inches then Turn Right 90 then Forward 24 inches then Land.

8Place the drone on the marked Start spot. Click RUN. Watch the flight.

9Did it close the square? Measure the gap from where it landed to the Start spot. Record.

10Adjust if needed: if the drone undershoots, increase Forward distance. If it does not turn 90 degrees cleanly, adjust the turn block (Tip: Echo lets you tweak the turn-block timing or speed if 90 is not exactly 90).

11Re-run. Measure new gap. Goal: within 15 cm of Start in 3 attempts.

The Build - L-Shape Pattern

12Now write a program for an L-Shape: Take Off then Forward 36 inches then Turn Left 90 then Forward 24 inches then Land.

13Run it. Did it land at the corner of the L?

Doesn't have to be perfect on the first run. Real engineers iterate. Tweak the numbers, re-run, observe.

My APEX flew a square within 15 cm of Start

My APEX flew an L-shape

3. AI Check

Woven notebook: as the AI helps or fails, write down exactly what you fed it and what it gave back. The trail of prompts and outputs IS your data.

AI Critiques Your Block Code

1Take a screenshot of your block code in Echo. Paste the screenshot (or describe the block sequence in plain English) into Gemini. Type: 'Here is my block-coded drone flight. What is one thing I could simplify or improve?'

2Read the AI's suggestion. Common AI answers: 'use a Repeat loop instead of writing 4 turns separately' (preview of tomorrow), or 'set the turn duration manually for more accurate 90 degrees'.

3Apply the AI's suggestion (if it makes sense to you). Re-run. Did it improve?

AI cannot run your drone, but it can READ your block sequence and spot inefficiency. Real software engineers do this every day with AI code review.

4. Class Data

Woven notebook: pull your data into a clean table. Write the trend you see in one sentence. If you cannot describe it in one sentence, you do not understand it yet.

Class Square Accuracy

Square-Pattern Gap to Start (cm)

Pair	Attempt 1	Attempt 2	Attempt 3	Tweak made
A
B
C
D

1Which pair had the smallest final gap? What did they tweak?

Closing the loop within 15 cm is REAL precision for a small drone. Pro drone shows are choreographed to within 5 cm. Your APEX is not far behind.

5. Wrap

Woven notebook: answer the reflection prompts in writing before you leave. Tomorrow's session starts where today's notebook ends.

Pathway: Drone Software Engineer

Day in the Life of an Embedded Engineer

Check out this video to see a real professional in this role. Embedded engineers write the low-level autopilot code drones run. Same blocks you wrote today, in C and Python.

Drone Software Engineer: What they do: write the autopilot code that flies commercial drones, military UAVs, and consumer hobby drones. The code that you ran today is the same kind of code these engineers write. Entry pathway: BS Computer Science or Computer Engineering. Cal State LA's CS BS plus drone-club projects. Internship pipeline: Skydio, Anduril, AeroVironment - all SoCal companies hiring CS students. Salary band (Glassdoor LA 2024): entry 100,000 to 130,000. Mid-career 145,000 to 200,000. First step from where you sit today: keep your Echo programs in a portfolio. Apply to summer programs at JPL, Lockheed, or local hackathons.

Spotlight: Dr. Ayanna Howard: Dr. Howard (1966 to present) is a roboticist who worked at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory. She developed SmartNav - the software that lets Mars rovers move autonomously. The Curiosity rover does not need every move radioed from Earth because of the code engineers like her wrote. She is now a pioneer in Human-Robot Interaction - teaching robots to help and learn from people. The block code you wrote today is the simplest version of what she designed for Mars.

Reflection

1Reflection 1: what surprised you about how the AI saw your code?

2Reflection 2: what is the difference between code that reads correct and code that flies correct?

3Reflection 3: tomorrow we add LOOPS. What do you predict a loop will let you do?

My APEX flew a square autonomously

I logged the gap-to-Start data

Built by Woven Learning & Technology✎ Edit

Day 11: Echo Coding - Loops, Zigzag, and Distance Math

Autonomous Systems Engineer Pathway - Repetition and Variables

1. Spark

Woven notebook: open your notebook now. Use it to capture every prediction, partner discussion, and question that comes up in this phase. Your notebook is the record of your thinking.

APEX 149 Coding Drone Tutorial (Refresher from Day 10)

Re-watch this short refresher to remember what you learned earlier. Same APEX coding tutorial. Re-watch the loop section if you need a refresher.

Foundations - Loops

The Hook: In 2010 a single Tesla manufacturing line had 90 robotic arms. Each arm did the SAME 30 motions on every car, 24 hours a day. The arms did not have unique programs - they had ONE program, written inside a LOOP. Loops are how programs scale from doing one thing to doing 10,000 things. Today you teach your drone its first loop.

Yesterday you wrote 4 Forward + 4 Turn blocks for a square. That is 8 blocks of repetition. Today you write ONE Forward + ONE Turn inside a REPEAT 4 TIMES block. That is 3 blocks total. Same square. Same drone path. Different code. Less repetition. The skill is recognizing patterns and replacing them with loops.

1Talk to your partner: name 3 things in your daily life that are loops.

2Predict: a square pattern with a LOOP block versus a square pattern WITHOUT a loop - will they fly the same? Or will the loop change the flight path?

I can write a square as a loop

2. Lab

Woven notebook: keep your notebook open as you build. Record your hypothesis, every measurement and observation, and what surprised you. Your notebook is your lab record for today.

Materials per pair: APEX 149 + controller + laptop with https://echo.pitsco.com open, fresh battery, painters tape (mark Start), eyewear, flight zone, notebook.

Today's task with Pitsco Echo: replace 4 separate move blocks with a LOOP - so the drone can do more with less code. You will also vary distance with a hopscotch pattern. Code Here - Pitsco Echo (block coding for APEX): Web app: https://echo.pitsco.com - open it in Google Chrome or Microsoft Edge on a laptop or Chromebook. It will NOT connect in Safari or on an iPad/tablet, and there is no account or sign-in - the site is 100% web-based. Before you press Connect: (1) power the controller OFF - the drone will not accept code from the browser while it is still paired to its controller; (2) power-cycle the drone so it is ready to pair; (3) turn ON your laptop's Bluetooth. Echo connects to the drone over the LAPTOP's Bluetooth - not the phone. Now click CONNECT on echo.pitsco.com and pick your drone in the Bluetooth pop-up that appears. (For this workshop you code in the browser, not on the phone. The Tspeed 7 phone app is used later only for first-person camera flight over WiFi, so you do not need it for these autonomous missions.) Drag blocks from the left palette into the canvas. Click RUN. The drone flies your code. The OFF switch on the drone or controller is your kill button.

APEX 149 Coding Drone Tutorial (Refresher from Day 10)

Re-watch this short refresher to remember what you learned earlier. Same APEX coding tutorial. Re-watch the loop section if you need a refresher.

The Hypothesis

1Predict: a square coded with a loop and a square coded without a loop - will they fly differently? Or fly the same?

Build 1 - Square with a Loop

2Open Echo. Build: Take Off then REPEAT 4 TIMES { Forward 24 inches then Turn Right 90 } then Land.

3Run. Measure gap to Start. Compare to yesterday's square gap. Same? Better? Worse?

Build 2 - Zigzag Pattern

4Build: Take Off then REPEAT 3 TIMES { Forward 18 inches then Turn Right 45 then Forward 18 inches then Turn Left 45 } then Land.

5Run. Watch the zigzag path. Adjust the angles or distances if it does not look like a clean zigzag.

Build 3 - Distance Increment Challenge

6Mission: take off, fly forward, return. Repeat 3 times. Each time, increase the forward distance by 12 inches: 12, then 24, then 36.

7Sketch the flight path in your notebook before coding. Then build it in Echo (you may need to write the 3 forward-and-back sequences out separately, or use a more advanced loop with a variable - try both).

8Run. Watch the drone make 3 progressively longer out-and-back trips. Check that it returns to the Start spot each time.

Real engineers measure floor space first. 12 + 24 + 36 = 72 inches forward at the longest leg. Make sure your zone is bigger than that. Adjust the increments down if needed.

I flew a looped square

I flew a zigzag pattern

I flew the distance-increment mission

3. AI Check

Woven notebook: as the AI helps or fails, write down exactly what you fed it and what it gave back. The trail of prompts and outputs IS your data.

AI Refactors Your Code

1Take your distance-increment program (3 separate forward-and-back sequences). Paste it (or describe it) into Gemini. Ask: 'Can this program be rewritten using a loop with a variable that increments by 12 each time? Show me the cleaner version.'

2Read the AI's refactored code. Translate it into Echo blocks if you can.

REFACTORING is when you keep the program's behavior the same but make the CODE shorter or clearer. Real engineers refactor weekly. AI is great at this kind of work.

4. Class Data

Woven notebook: pull your data into a clean table. Write the trend you see in one sentence. If you cannot describe it in one sentence, you do not understand it yet.

Class Loop Efficiency

Block Count - With vs Without Loops

Pair	Square (no loop)	Square (with loop)	Zigzag	Distance Increment
A
B
C
D

1What is the average block-count savings when using a loop?

Loops are how a single coder writes a program that does 1,000 things. Real autopilots use thousands of nested loops every second.

5. Wrap

Woven notebook: answer the reflection prompts in writing before you leave. Tomorrow's session starts where today's notebook ends.

Pathway: Embedded Systems Engineer

Day in the Life of an Embedded Software Engineer

Watch this video to see what a real day in this career actually looks like. A working embedded engineer's day. Loops and variables are her bread and butter.

Embedded Systems Engineer: What they do: write the low-level code that runs inside cars, drones, medical devices, and IoT sensors. Loops are their bread and butter. Entry pathway: BS Computer Engineering or Electrical Engineering. Cal State LA's CompE BS is direct. Internships at Northrop, Boeing, Honeywell, all SoCal-based. Salary band (Glassdoor LA 2024): entry 100,000 to 125,000. Mid-career 140,000 to 190,000.

Reflection

1Reflection 1: where in your life have you noticed a pattern that helped you do something faster?

2Reflection 2: when does a loop make code clearer? When does it make code harder to read?

3Reflection 3: tomorrow we run a real mission - search and rescue on Catalina Island. What kind of code might you need?

I built and flew a looped program

I have notebook-logged the block-count savings

Built by Woven Learning & Technology✎ Edit

Day 12: Catalina Mission Phase 1 - First Sighting

Autonomous Systems Engineer Pathway - FPV Flight + Visual Acquisition

1. Spark

Woven notebook: open your notebook now. Use it to capture every prediction, partner discussion, and question that comes up in this phase. Your notebook is the record of your thinking.

Yesterday you wrote your first autonomous flight - a square pattern. Today you write loops and zigzags so the drone can do more with less code.

Santa Catalina Island - Aerial 4K View

Watch this short video to see why today's topic matters before we dive in. Real aerial drone footage of the actual island where today's mission takes place. This is your operational area.

Binary Numbers - Refresher

Re-watch this short refresher to remember what you learned earlier. Techquickie's 4-minute explainer. Watch this if you do not remember how binary works - you will need it to decode the clue.

Foundations - First-Person View (FPV)

- we have a real mission today.

The Hook: A research drone has crashed on an unstable crater wall on Catalina Island. Before its main power failed, its e-ink screen froze, displaying a binary code message - our first vital clue.

MISSION BRIEFING - Catalina Code Recovery, Phase 1: First Sighting: A research drone has crashed on an unstable crater wall on Catalina Island. Before its main power failed, its e-ink screen froze, displaying a binary code message - our first vital clue. The section of the crater wall with the first code is in a known zone. You can see the general area from your launch point. Your Objective: - From your designated launch area, pilot your drone toward the crater wall where the first binary code is displayed. - Even though you might see the target with your own eyes, your primary goal is to practice steady flight and clear visual acquisition through your drone's camera. - Use the live video feed in the Tspeed 7 app to get a stable, readable view of the binary code. - Write down the code or capture a clear photo through the app. - Practice smooth maneuvers and controlled hovering to ensure the code is legible in your video feed. - Safely return your drone to the launch point. Challenge Advisory: that crater wall is fragile. Unsteady flight or hovering too close kicks up dust and makes the code difficult to read on your screen. Focus on precise control.

FPV = First-Person View. You see what the drone sees, through its camera, on your phone screen. Your APEX has an onboard camera that streams live video to the Tspeed 7 app. Today you fly with EYES on the drone (visual flight) but use the camera FEED to capture data the drone can see better than you can. This is how real search-and-rescue drones work: a pilot flies the drone close to a survivor, and the camera reads what the human eye cannot.

1Predict: how steady will your hover need to be for the binary code on the e-ink screen to be readable on your phone?

I understand the FPV concept

I can decode binary

2. Lab

Woven notebook: keep your notebook open as you build. Record your hypothesis, every measurement and observation, and what surprised you. Your notebook is your lab record for today.

Materials per pair: APEX 149 + controller + phone with Tspeed 7, fresh battery, 1 printed binary clue at hover height (instructor pre-tapes), painters tape Start spot, eyewear, flight zone, notebook with binary decoding chart.

Today's task with Tspeed 7 (FPV Mode): fly with the drone's onboard camera as your only view. The screen IS your cockpit - first day of seeing through the drone's eyes. Code Here - Tspeed 7 FPV App: Today is the FIRST DAY you fly the drone via the PHONE APP, not the controller. Per the manual: 'The controller will not work if the drone is connected to your device. The app control will not work if the drone is paired to a controller.' Pick one. Today: app. Steps: 1. Power off the controller (so the drone is not paired to it). 2. Power on the drone. The blue LED will flash. 3. On your phone: open Settings > WiFi. Connect to the network 'Tspeed7-XXXXX' (the X's are unique to your drone, printed on the drone underside). Your phone will say 'No Internet' - that is correct; you are connected to the drone, not the internet. 4. Open the Tspeed 7 app. Tap CONTROL. The live camera view appears with virtual joysticks on screen. iOS: https://apps.apple.com/in/app/tspeed-7/id1575505851 Android: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.apex.at149 On the screen: virtual LEFT joystick (altitude + yaw), virtual RIGHT joystick (forward/backward + roll). Same map as the physical controller. SCREENSHOT button bottom right - use it to capture the binary clue.

How to Fly FPV Drones - The 4 Stick Controls

Carefully watch this short video to learn FPV flying BEFORE you take off. The 4 stick controls (throttle, yaw, pitch, roll) on Tspeed 7's virtual joysticks work the same as on any FPV drone. Once you have the muscle memory, the app is just the screen showing what the drone sees.

Safety: eyewear ON. Stay in your taped flight zone. The 'crater walls' (printed binary code on cardstock) are NOT to be flown into - hover 30 cm away minimum. Crash protocol: LEFT STICK ALL THE WAY DOWN.

Mission Phase 1 - Visual Sighting

1Pre-flight: connect drone to controller. Connect phone to drone WiFi. Verify the live camera feed is working before takeoff.

2Set the phone where pilot OR co-pilot can see the screen. Decide who watches the screen and who watches the drone. Communicate.

3Take off from the marked Start. Fly slowly toward the binary clue on the wall. Hover 30 cm away.

How to capture and recover the photo (Tspeed 7 specifics): 1. The Tspeed 7 app has a SCREENSHOT button in the bottom-right corner of the live FPV view. Tap it once when the binary code is sharp and centered in the frame. The button briefly flashes white to confirm. 2. The screenshot saves to your phone's Photos app (iOS) or Gallery / Files (Android). It is a regular .jpg image you can email, AirDrop, share to Drive, or upload directly. 3. For Phase 3 today: open https://gemini.google.com (sign in with your school Google account). Tap the paper-clip / image-upload icon in the prompt box. Pick the screenshot you just captured. Then type your decode prompt. If the screenshot is blurry or off-center, fly back, re-hover steady, and capture again. Better to retry than to upload a useless image.

4Co-pilot: watch the live feed on the phone. When the binary code is sharp and readable, take a screenshot. Confirm out loud: 'Got it.'

5If the screenshot is blurry or the code is unreadable, reposition the drone (steady hover, slightly different angle, more light) and re-screenshot.

6Pilot: when the co-pilot confirms, fly the drone back to Start. Land.

Quick binary decoder reference: each 8-bit binary number = 1 ASCII character. Examples: A=01000001, B=01000010, C=01000011, S=01010011, O=01001111. To decode, split your binary into 8-digit groups (separated by spaces or every 8 digits), then look up each group on a reference chart - or paste the whole binary string into this online converter: https://cryptii.com/pipes/binary-to-text/ (paste left side, read text on right side). Same site works for tomorrow's Day 13 mission too. Verify your hand-decode against the converter - if they disagree, recheck your spacing.

7Together: decode the binary code into letters or numbers. Write the decoded message in your notebook.

Doesn't have to be perfect on the first run. If the screenshot is blurry, take off again. Real search-and-rescue pilots routinely re-attempt - that is the work.

I captured a clear screenshot of the binary clue

I decoded the binary into a message

My drone is back at Start, intact

3. AI Check

Woven notebook: as the AI helps or fails, write down exactly what you fed it and what it gave back. The trail of prompts and outputs IS your data.

AI Reads the Image

How To Upload an Image to Google Gemini AI

Watch this short tutorial first if you have never uploaded an image to Gemini. Same flow on phone or laptop: tap the paper-clip / image icon in the prompt box, pick your binary screenshot, then type your decode prompt below the image.

1Open Gemini. Upload your binary screenshot. Type: 'What binary code is on this e-ink screen? Decode it to ASCII.'

2Compare the AI's decoded message to your hand-decoded message. Did they agree?

3If they disagreed, who is right? Re-check your manual decoding step by step.

This is exactly how modern search-and-rescue teams work. The drone captures the image. The pilot decides whether the AI's reading is trustworthy. The pilot has the final call.

4. Class Data

Woven notebook: pull your data into a clean table. Write the trend you see in one sentence. If you cannot describe it in one sentence, you do not understand it yet.

Class Mission Log

Phase 1 Mission Outcomes

Pair	Decoded message	Attempts	AI agreed?
A
B
C
D

1Did everyone decode the same message? If not, why?

Real search-and-rescue requires multiple confirmations. One drone, one pilot, one screenshot = not enough. Multiple teams cross-checking = trustworthy.

5. Wrap

Woven notebook: answer the reflection prompts in writing before you leave. Tomorrow's session starts where today's notebook ends.

Pathway: Search and Rescue Drone Pilot

9 Growing Jobs for Drone Pilots in 2025

Check out this video to see a real professional in this role. Search-and-rescue is one of the fastest-growing branches of commercial drone work.

Search and Rescue Drone Pilot: What they do: fly drones into wildfires, mountainsides, collapsed buildings, and flooded areas to locate survivors. They work for fire departments, the Coast Guard, and state emergency management. Entry pathway: FAA Part 107 license (you can take the test at 16). California also has search-and-rescue volunteer pilot programs. CalFire actively recruits drone pilots. Salary band: volunteer-track until 18, then 50,000 to 90,000 for full-time public-safety drone pilots. Specialty SAR pilots can hit 100,000+.

Reflection

1Reflection 1: who took the lead in your pair - pilot or co-pilot? Why did that work?

2Reflection 2: when has a teammate seen something you missed?

3Reflection 3: tomorrow you fly BLIND - no line of sight, only the camera feed. What concerns you?

I completed Phase 1

I have the decoded message in my notebook

I know my role for tomorrow

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Day 13: Catalina Mission Phase 2 - Blind FPV Retrieval

Autonomous Systems Engineer Pathway - Camera-Only Navigation

1. Spark

Woven notebook: open your notebook now. Use it to capture every prediction, partner discussion, and question that comes up in this phase. Your notebook is the record of your thinking.

Today's goal: fly the drone using ONLY its onboard camera (no looking at the drone). Find a hidden binary code on the wall and decode it.

How Self-Driving Cars See

Watch the video to set up today's thinking - this is the real-world story behind the lab. How autonomous systems navigate using camera feeds when the human cannot see directly. Same skill, smaller drone.

Foundations - Trusting the Feed

The Hook: Intel indicates a SECOND, even more critical binary code on a different, remote section of the Catalina crater wall. This time, the target area is NOT directly visible from your piloting station - you fly entirely on the drone's camera feed.

MISSION BRIEFING - Catalina Code Recovery, Phase 2: Blind Data Retrieval: Excellent work yesterday, pilots. Intel now indicates a SECOND, even more critical binary code on a different, remote section of the Catalina crater wall. This time, the target area is NOT directly visible from your piloting station. Your Objective: - Launch your drone from a position where you cannot see the target wall with your own eyes (the instructor will set up a screen or designate a hidden location). - This is a First-Person View (FPV) ONLY challenge. You rely entirely on your drone's live video feed through the Tspeed 7 app. - Using only the drone's camera, navigate to find the new binary code on the designated crater wall section. - Once located, capture a clear screenshot of this second code. - Safely navigate your drone back to its launch point using FPV only. Critical Challenge: flying blind using only your drone's camera demands patience, smooth control, and clear communication with your team. Trust your drone's perspective.

When you cannot see the drone, the camera feed IS your reality. The screen shows you a narrow view (the drone's camera has a limited field of view). Things to your left and right are invisible. Three FPV survival rules: 1. SLOW. Move slowly. Misreading the screen at speed = crash. 2. ROTATE TO LOOK. If you can't find the target, rotate the drone (yaw) to scan the room. 3. ALWAYS KNOW WHERE HOME IS. Mentally track which direction is back to the launch point.

1Predict: when you fly blind, will you crash more, the same, or less than when you fly with line of sight?

I understand FPV-only flight

I know the 3 survival rules

2. Lab

Woven notebook: keep your notebook open as you build. Record your hypothesis, every measurement and observation, and what surprised you. Your notebook is your lab record for today.

Materials per pair: APEX 149 + controller + phone with Tspeed 7, fresh battery, 1 printed binary clue at hover height in the hidden zone, painters tape Start spot, screen or divider blocking line of sight, eyewear, flight zone, notebook.

Today's task with Tspeed 7: extend yesterday's FPV flying into a TRUE blind mission - line of sight to the drone is blocked by a screen, so the camera feed is your ONLY information. Code Here - Tspeed 7 App (FPV Mode): Power OFF the controller (so drone is not paired to it). Power on the drone. On your phone: Settings > WiFi. Connect to the network 'Tspeed7-XXXXX' (printed on the underside of YOUR drone). Phone says 'No Internet' - that's correct. Open Tspeed 7 app. Tap CONTROL. Live camera feed appears with virtual joysticks on screen. iOS: https://apps.apple.com/in/app/tspeed-7/id1575505851 Android: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.apex.at149

Safety: eyewear ON. Spotter standing OUTSIDE the FPV-only zone watches for runaway drones and calls 'STOP' if needed. Pilot is forbidden from peeking. Crash protocol: LEFT STICK ALL THE WAY DOWN.

Mission Phase 2 - Blind Retrieval

Why this app: today you fly BLIND - eyes on the screen only - so the drone's camera has to see a small printed binary code clearly. If the room is too dark, the camera reads garbage. The ArUco Lux Simulator (below) lets you slide the lux value low and watch detection accuracy collapse - same physics as your live mission. Run it for 2 minutes BEFORE you take off so you know what 'enough light' looks like.

1Open the ArUco Lux Simulator (above). Slide the lux value DOWN from 1000 → 500 → 200 → 100 → 50. At each step, watch detection accuracy. Find the lux threshold where detection drops below 80% - that's your minimum lighting requirement for today's blind FPV mission.

Lux Pre-Check (5 min)

Lux check on your room: use a phone Lux meter app to measure the actual room. If it reads above 200 lux, you are clear to fly. Below 200 - turn on more lights or move closer to the window.

2Use a phone Lux meter app (or estimate). Is the room above 200 lux? If not, ask the instructor to turn on more lights.

3Decide roles: PILOT (sticks, sees only screen) and COMMS (watches the spotter for safety calls, also tracks 'mental map' of where home is).

4PILOT: stand behind the screen so the drone is not visible. Phone running Tspeed 7 in hand (drone is paired to phone, NOT controller, today). COMMS: same side as PILOT, watches the spotter for safety calls and tracks 'mental map' of where home is.

5Take off slowly from Start. Watch ONLY the screen.

6Search for the binary clue: yaw slowly, scan the room. When the clue appears in the camera view, hover and steady.

Photo workflow (refresher from Day 12): tap the SCREENSHOT button in the bottom-right of Tspeed 7's FPV view when the binary clue is sharp. The image saves to your phone's Photos / Gallery. Today you will decode the binary by hand together with yesterday's message - no Gemini upload needed unless you want to verify.

7Capture screenshot of the second binary clue. COMMS confirms 'got it'.

8Navigate home: yaw the drone to face the launch direction (use the mental map). Fly forward to home. Land.

Binary decoder refresher: same converter as Day 12 - https://cryptii.com/pipes/binary-to-text/ - paste the binary on the left, read the ASCII on the right. Combine today's decoded word with yesterday's to see the full mission message.

9Decode the binary. Together with yesterday's message, what does the combined clue say?

If your drone disappears from the camera view (flew under a desk, etc.) - call SPOTTER. Do not panic-stick. The spotter walks to the drone and recovers it physically.

I flew the drone using ONLY the camera feed

I captured the second binary clue

I decoded the combined message

3. AI Check

Woven notebook: as the AI helps or fails, write down exactly what you fed it and what it gave back. The trail of prompts and outputs IS your data.

AI Suggests Tracking Improvements

1Open Gemini. Type: 'My drone follows visual targets but loses them when the camera pans. What 3 algorithm improvements would let it lock on to a target and follow it automatically?'

2Read the AI's suggestions. Common answers: predict motion (Kalman filter), increase frame rate, widen search box, color thresholding.

3Discuss as a class: which of these would matter most for our binary-clue mission?

This is the work autonomy engineers do every day. They generate ideas, evaluate them, and ship the ones that work. You just did real-world autonomy engineering.

4. Class Data

Woven notebook: pull your data into a clean table. Write the trend you see in one sentence. If you cannot describe it in one sentence, you do not understand it yet.

Week 2-3 Synthesis

Mission Phase Outcomes

Pair	Phase 1 message	Phase 2 message	Combined meaning
A
B
C
D

1What is the full combined message? Did all pairs converge?

2Share your team's final decoded message with the class. The instructor will collect each team's message on the front board so we can compare across pairs.

You just completed 9 days of aerodynamics + autonomy. You programmed manual flight, autonomous patterns, FPV missions, and decoded real binary clues. You know more about drones than 99 percent of US high schoolers.

5. Wrap

Woven notebook: answer the reflection prompts in writing before you leave. Tomorrow's session starts where today's notebook ends.

Pathway: Autonomous Systems Engineer

Day in the Life - Boston Dynamics Robotics Engineer

Watch this video to picture yourself in this career 5 to 10 years from now. Closing the loop between camera and motors is exactly what Boston Dynamics engineers do every day.

Autonomous Systems Engineer: What they do: integrate perception (camera), planning (algorithm), and control (motors) into one working autonomous system. The 'glue' engineer between AI teams and hardware teams. Entry pathway: BS Computer Engineering or Robotics. Cal State LA + transfer to USC's MS in Robotics or UCLA's CS Vision concentration. Salary band (Glassdoor LA 2024): entry 115,000 to 140,000. Mid-career 165,000 to 220,000.

Spotlight: Dr. Gladys West: Dr. West (1930 to 2026) was a mathematician at the US Naval Surface Warfare Center who did the foundational math for GPS - the system every autonomous drone, car, and plane uses to know where it is. When you flew your APEX with a heading and distance today, you were using technology that Dr. West invented. For most of her career, her name was barely known. She was inducted into the Air Force Hall of Fame at age 88. Brilliance is sometimes invisible until someone bothers to look.

Reflection

1Reflection 1: what was hardest about flying without seeing the drone?

2Reflection 2: when in your life have you had to trust something you could not see?

3Reflection 3: next week we trade drones for stethoscopes. What does autonomy look like in medicine?

Week 3 Complete - pilots (Autonomy + Catalina): Four days of autonomous flight, programming the drone to fly itself, and recovering binary clues from a search-and-rescue mission. Phase 1 visual sighting + Phase 2 blind FPV retrieval - both decoded. Stand up. Group photo with your decoded message held up. You finished Week 3. Group photo. Sign your notebook. See you next session.

I completed Phase 2 of the Catalina mission

I shared my team's decoded message with the class

I completed Week 2-3 of the program

Built by Woven Learning & Technology✎ Edit

Day 14: Vitals Stations

You are the EMT. Read the body at five hands-on stations.

⏱ Full day

SparkThe 60-Second Patient10 min

An ambulance pulls up. You have 60 seconds to tell the doctor everything about this patient's body. No machines yet, just you. What would you measure?

Take a few guesses out loud. Heartbeat? Breathing? Temperature? You are closer than you think.

▶What an EMT does in the first 60 seconds

Watch how a real EMT reads a body fast. Then you become the EMT.

Today you ARE the EMT. Five stations. Each one is a real vital sign. You will measure them on each other and write down real numbers.

Hands-OnThe Five Vitals Stations2.5 hrs

How the stations work

Keep your own data in your notebook - you decide what to measure, how to lay out your table, and what your results prove, like a real data scientist. Make it neat enough to show off.

Grab your notebook.One per person. This is the chart you fill in by hand all day.

Scan the QR code at your station.A 30-second video shows you exactly how to take that measurement.

Measure your partner, then record each reading in your notebook.Real data, on a real person, in your own handwriting.

Rotate when you hear the signal.Hit all five stations before the day is done.

Your five stations

1 - Heart Rate

Fingertip pulse oximeter. Resting, then after 20 jumping jacks.

2 - Blood Pressure

Use the gear you have: a real cuff + stethoscope (listen for the first and last thump), OR an automatic arm monitor (press start, read the screen). There is a QR how-to for each.

3 - Breathing Rate

Count breaths for 30 seconds while your partner is calm.

4 - Temperature

Forehead or ear thermometer. Compare across the team.

5 - Capillary Refill

Press the fingernail, time how fast the color comes back.

Before you leave a station, double-check that every box on your chart is filled in.At the end, circle the ONE number that surprised you most and write one sentence: why?

CareerWho does this for a living?12 min

▶A day in the life of an EMT

The job you just practiced - paramedics and EMTs on a real shift.

Emergency Medical Technician (EMT)

About $40,000 to $54,000 a year in California - and you can be certified in 4 to 6 months.

EMTs read vitals exactly the way you did today, often in a moving ambulance. It is one of the fastest doorways into healthcare in California.

From today on we document like a real medical team. In medicine, if it is not documented, it did not happen. Photo your work every single time.

☷ Scan to upload

Post your notebook

Snap a photo of your finished chart and upload it to today's Padlet. Real clinicians keep their records - so do we, starting now.

↗ On a computer? Open the Padlet board to upload

Built by Woven Learning & Technology✎ Edit

Day 15: The Banana Clinic - Suturing 101

Today you become the surgeon. A patient comes in with a cut that won't close, and your hands are going to close it.

⏱ Full day

SparkA Cut That Won't Close15 min

Sofia, 16, just wiped out on her skateboard. A 5 cm gash on her forearm. Leave it open and infection gets in. A clean stitch pulls the edges together so skin heals straight and strong.

⚠ Heads Up

There's a clock on a cut like this: close it within about 6 hours or the infection risk climbs.

Real surgeons don't learn on people first. They practice the exact stitch you're about to learn, on fruit.

The one stitch you will master today: the simple interrupted suture.

Hands-OnScrub In: Stitch the BananaMost of the day

One stitch to master today: the simple interrupted suture. Learn it, then close a wound with it.

Keep your own data in your notebook - you decide what to measure, how to lay out your table, and what your results prove, like a real data scientist. Make it neat enough to show off.

⚠ Heads Up

Needles are sharp and real. Pass them point-down, never toss them, drop used ones straight into the sharps container. Gloves on the whole time.

Meet Your Tools

Pick up your kitNeedle driver (holds the needle), forceps (tweezers that lift the skin edge), scissors, suture packet. Grip: thumb and ring finger in the needle driver loops, pointer steadying the top.

Make the Wound

Cut your patientOne clean 3-4 cm slice through the banana peel. This is Sofia's laceration. The two peel edges are the skin you're going to bring together.

Place the Stitch

In one side, out the otherDrive the needle through the peel about 5 mm from the cut on one side, then up through the other side 5 mm out. Pull the thread until a short tail is left.

Tie the knotWrap the long thread around the needle driver twice, grab the tail, pull snug so the edges just touch. Wrap once the other way and pull again. That's a surgeon's square knot. Snip the ends.

Repeat down the woundSpace stitches about 5 mm apart, even like rungs on a ladder. Close the whole cut. Pull just enough to meet the edges; if the peel bunches white, you pulled too hard.

Level Up (if you have suture pads)

Move to the suture padSilicone skin feels closer to the real thing. Lay 3 clean simple interrupted stitches: even spacing, edges meeting flat, no gaps, no overlap.

Score your work in your notebookin your notebook, rate your best stitched wound 1-5 on even spacing, edges meeting cleanly, and knot holding. Have a partner score it too, mark which wound was your best, and write one sentence on what you'd do differently on a real patient.

CareerWho Does This for a Living15 min

The hands you just trained belong to two real jobs in every California hospital.

Surgical Technologist

About $60,000 to $85,000 a year in California, reachable in about 1 to 2 years through a community college certificate, no four-year degree required.

The surgical tech preps the sterile field, hands the surgeon every instrument, and keeps the operation moving. The steady, precise hands you used on the banana are exactly the skill they're hired for.

Surgeon

Often $300,000 or more a year in California, after medical school and a surgical residency.

Surgeons close wounds, remove disease, and rebuild what's broken inside the body, and they practiced this exact simple interrupted stitch before they ever touched a patient.

Surgical technologists on a real OR team - the steady hands you just practiced.

☷ Scan to upload

Post your notebook

Snap a photo of your finished card and best stitched wound, then upload it to today's Padlet. Like a real medical team: if it isn't documented, it didn't happen.

↗ On a computer? Open the Padlet board to upload

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Day 16: Surgery Through a Keyhole

Finish your stitches, then operate through a tiny hole while watching a screen and moving backward.

⏱ Full day

SparkOperate Without Looking at Your Hands10 min

How do surgeons fix what's inside you through three holes the size of a pencil?

The tool pivots at the tiny hole. Hand left, tip right. Up is down. Push is pull. And you only get to watch a flat screen.

A surgeon operates through keyhole cuts while watching a monitor. Watch the hands and the screen at the same time.

Hands-OnLevel Up Your Stitches, Then Operate Through the Box4 hr

Part 1 - Finish Strong: The Timed Close

Keep your own data in your notebook - you decide what to measure, how to lay out your table, and what your results prove, like a real data scientist. Make it neat enough to show off.

You learned the stitch yesterday. Today you make it clean and fast, the way a surgeon has to in a real wound.

Warm up your handsRun 3 clean interrupted stitches. Edges meet, no blanching, knots flat. Quality before speed.

Now go harder: the timed closeClose a 5 cm wound with 4 evenly spaced stitches. A partner times you. Run it twice and beat your first time without sloppy spacing. Record both attempt times and a quality score in your notebook. Slow is smooth, smooth is fast.

Part 2 - Laparoscopy: Operate by Watching a Screen

Now switch to laparoscopy. You operate on the laparoscopy boxes and the laparoscopic machine: a camera goes inside, your hands stay outside, and you work looking ONLY at the screen. Build your surgical team and begin.

1 - Pick your setup

Option A: a DIY cardboard box with hand-holes and a phone or USB camera. Option B: the HEALER torso trainer (built-in ports, camera, light, monitor). Same fulcrum effect either way.

2 - Build your team

SURGEON works the two graspers, eyes on the screen. CAMERA OPERATOR aims and steadies the camera. PROCEDURE MANAGER reads steps, runs the timer, records data in their notebook, calls out peeking. A group of 4 adds a SURGICAL ASSISTANT.

3 - Rotate

Swap roles after every timed attempt so everyone plays Surgeon, Camera, and Manager at least once.

⚠ Heads Up

OR principles, enforce all four: NO PEEKING (screen only, never your hands) | SMALL OPENINGS | CLEAN PROCEDURE | QUICK, THOROUGH, SAFE - safe first.

Drill A - Pick and Place (6 objects)One grasper in each hand, eyes on the screen. Pick up each of 6 objects from the LEFT, hand them off MID-AIR (not resting on a peg), set them on the RIGHT. Then bring all 6 back. Run 3 timed attempts, rotating after each. Tally objects moved, drops, and time in your notebook. Under 5 min is excellent, 5-8 is solid. Attempt 1 always runs long - that's the point.

Drill B - Thread the Loop (precision step)DIY box: tie a single knot in a piece of string using only your two graspers, no hands. Torso trainer: cut along the circle drawn on the gauze square, stay on the line. 5-minute limit either way.

⚠ Heads Up

Wipe the graspers and box ports with an alcohol wipe between users. Real infection control.

Close out your notebookFill in your OR team roles and write one line on the log: did you get faster across the attempts, and what does that tell you about skill versus talent?

CareerThe Minimally Invasive Surgeon10 min

That reversed-hand, screen-only skill you just fought? People train for years to master it.

Surgical techs and first assistants set up the OR, pass instruments, and run the laparoscopic camera - the exact roles you just rotated through.

Minimally Invasive / Laparoscopic Surgeon

About $300,000 to $500,000+ a year in California, after medical school and surgical residency. The surgical tech who runs the camera beside them earns about $55,000 to $100,000 a year and trains in about 2 years at an LA community college.

They operate through tiny ports, watching a screen, fighting the same fulcrum reversal you felt today. First step from where you sit: shadow or volunteer in a hospital surgical services department. The path continues to surgical tech, PA, nurse, or surgeon.

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Post your notebook

Photo your notebook page and upload it to today's Padlet. Clinicians document everything: if it is not documented, it did not happen.

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Day 17: Blood Type Detective

A patient is bleeding out on your bench. The wrong blood will kill her. Find the match.

⏱ Full day

SparkWhose Blood Can Save Her?10 min

A patient is bleeding out in the ER. Four donors are standing by. Pick the wrong one and her blood clumps up and kills her in minutes.

TED-Ed: the 4 blood types and the rule for who can safely give blood to whom.

That clumping has a name: agglutination. Today YOU are the blood bank tech. Test four mystery patients, watch for the clump, and decide who can save who.

Hands-OnRun the Blood Typing KitMost of the day

⚠ Heads Up

Simulated blood and antisera are non-toxic but can stain. Gloves on, nothing in your mouth, no food at the bench.

Watch how a sample clumps when it meets its matching antibody - that grainy clumping is your answer.

Guess first

Keep your own data in your notebook - you decide what to measure, how to lay out your table, and what your results prove, like a real data scientist. Make it neat enough to show off.

Look, don't test - yet.Line up your four simulated blood samples: Donor 1, 2, 3, and 4. Write a guess for each one's blood type in your notebook.

Type every donor

Set up the tray.Glove up. For one donor, put a drop of their simulated blood into the three wells marked A, B, and Rh on the blood-typing tray.

Add the antisera.Add a drop of anti-A serum to the A well, anti-B to the B well, and anti-Rh (anti-D) to the Rh well. One clean drop each.

Agitate and read.Gently rock the tray to mix - no stirring needed (a clean toothpick per well is fine if you like). A grainy, clumpy well means agglutination: that is a POSITIVE. Smooth and even means negative.

Call the type.Clumps with anti-A and anti-B = AB. Anti-A only = A. Anti-B only = B. Neither = O. Add a + if the Rh well clumps, a - if it does not.

Repeat for all four donors.Run Donor 1 through Donor 4. Record every well in your notebook before you decide anything.

Make the call

Save the patient.A patient is bleeding out. From your results, which donors can safely give to her? Which donor would be dangerous, and why?

Find the heroes.Which blood type is the universal donor (can give to anyone)? Which is the universal recipient (can receive from anyone)?

CareerThis Is Someone's Whole Job15 min

Every transfusion in the world depends on someone running the exact test you just ran.

Day in the life: a medical lab scientist runs blood typing and bloodwork all shift - the people behind every diagnosis.

Medical Laboratory Scientist / Blood Bank Technologist

About $60,000 to $105,000 a year in California - entry techs start around $60K-$75K, experienced blood bank specialists reach $105K.

They type and cross-match blood so every transfusion is safe - the same agglutination test you just ran. Pathway: a 2-year associate degree (LA City College, Cypress College) plus a CA license. First step from where you sit: take Biology, then chase a hospital lab or phlebotomy internship.

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Document your notebook

Clinicians document everything - if it is not documented, it did not happen. Snap a photo of your notebook page sheet and upload it to today's Padlet before you leave.

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Day 18: The AI Diagnosis Lab

Today you and an AI both read the same scans. Who catches what the other misses?

⏱ Full day

SparkCan AI catch what a tired doctor misses?10 min

A radiologist reads 200 scans a day. By scan 180, they are tired. Can a machine catch the spot they miss?

AI making high-stakes calls. We bring that same skepticism to medical AI today.

Chest X-rays, real study: AI alone 88%. Doctor alone 91%. Doctor + AI together 96%. The team won.

Today you are the doctor + AI team. Heads to the computer lab.

Hands-OnRead the patterns. Then check the AI.Most of the day

The one med-week day at computers. Big steps, low text. You read patterns, then see where you and the AI agree and where you split.

Keep your own data in your notebook - you decide what to measure, how to lay out your table, and what your results prove, like a real data scientist. Make it neat enough to show off.

⚠ Heads Up

Is today Friday? No computer lab on Fridays. Run this one whole-class off the projector - the teacher works the 6 cases on the big screen, you make every call in your notebook first. Bank the live you-vs-AI tool for the next computer day.

Friday Plan B - no computer lab

Friday version: read the projected cases.The teacher puts each pair of scans on the big screen, one case at a time. Same job as the lab - spot the difference with your own eyes first, then say it to your neighbor.

Friday version: make YOUR call on all 6.For each case decide: normal, needs follow-up, or send it now. Write your call in your notebook before anyone reveals anything.

Friday version: bring in the AI's call.No student screens today, so the teacher reveals the AI's call on the projector one case at a time. Record it next to yours. Where did you agree, where did you split?

Friday version: hunt the disagreement.Find the ONE case where you and the AI split the hardest. Argue it out. Name the single test that would settle it, and mark it to run on the tool next computer day.

Part I - Train your eye

Look before you click.Two scans side by side on the screen. One is healthy, one has a finding. Spot the difference with your own eyes first. Say it out loud to your neighbor.

Part II - You vs. the AI

Make YOUR call on 6 cases.Open the diagnostic activity. For each image, decide: normal, needs follow-up, or send it now. Write your call in your notebook before you peek at anything.

Now ask the AI.Feed the same case to the AI tool. Read its call. Record its call next to yours on the sheet. Where did you agree? Where did you split?

Hunt the disagreement.Find the ONE case where you and the AI split the hardest. Read the AI's reasoning. On your sheet, mark whether you agree or disagree with the AI, and name the one test that would settle it.

Part III - Backup station, no screen

Rotate to Jaspir's phlebotomy arm.When a computer frees up or your team finishes early, head to the hands-on station. Find the vein, set the angle, practice the draw on the training arm. Real clinical skill, no laptop.

⚠ Heads Up

These cases are fictional teaching examples. Never use AI to diagnose a real person. Real calls are made by licensed clinicians.

CareerThe people who read patterns for a living10 min

You just did what a whole healthcare team does daily - read patterns, check the machine, make the call.

A day in the life of a medical scientist - the people who test whether new tools, including AI, actually work on real patients.

Clinical Data / Radiology-AI Specialist

About $75,000 to $140,000 a year in California, senior radiology-AI roles higher.

They check whether a medical AI can be trusted before doctors rely on it - the exact you-vs-the-AI test you ran today. Pathway: a Biology, Public Health, or Health Sciences degree (Cal State LA's Public Health BS is a direct route). Phlebotomy, like Jaspir's station, is a paid way into healthcare right after high school.

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Document your work

Clinicians document everything - if it isn't documented, it didn't happen. Photo your notebook page and post it to today's Padlet before you leave.

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Day 19: Catching Sunlight

Free energy is falling on the parking lot right now. Today you catch it and measure exactly how much.

⏱ Full day

SparkFree Energy From the Sky10 min

The sun dumps about 1,000 watts on every square meter at noon. Can we catch it?

Light hits a panel, electrons move. That's the whole trick.

How solar panels turn photons into electrons. The voltage we measure today is that, happening on your bench.

Predict out loud: a cell right up to a lamp vs. across the room. Which makes more power, and by how much?

Hands-OnMeasure the SunlightMost of the day

Grab a solar cell, a multimeter, and a lamp. You're going to make real numbers and record them in your notebook.

Keep your own data in your notebook - you decide what to measure, how to lay out your table, and what your results prove, like a real data scientist. Make it neat enough to show off.

⚠ Heads Up

Lamps get HOT. Don't touch the bulb. Keep the cell at least 5 cm away.

Part I - Distance

Set up and clip inSet the multimeter to DC voltage (V). Clip the red and black leads to your solar cell.

Read voltage at 4 distancesHold the cell 10 cm from the lamp, wait 10 seconds, then write the number in your notebook. Then do 30 cm, 50 cm, and 100 cm.

Now read currentSwitch the meter to current (mA). Run the same 4 distances again and write each number in the Distance table on your Log.

Find the powerPower = Volts x Amps. For each distance multiply voltage by current (turn mA into A by dividing by 1000). Fill the Power column. Which distance wins?

Part II - Tilt

Tilt the cellHold the cell 30 cm away. Point it straight at the lamp and read the voltage. Now tilt it 45 degrees, then flat. Write all three in the Tilt table. What angle catches the most?

Part III - Make it spin

Build a paper propellerTwist a 6 cm x 1.5 cm cardstock rectangle so each end angles about 30 degrees. Tape the center to the motor shaft so it spins free.

Wire it and bring it to the lightClip the motor to your solar cell. Hold it 10 cm from the lamp, propeller up. It spins. Now back away slowly. At what distance does it die? Record that distance on your Log. That's your minimum power to do real work.

Call the winnerLook across all your numbers and write one line in your notebook: which condition gave the most power, and what happens to power as the cell moves away from the light?

CareerPeople Who Catch Sunlight for a Living10 min

You just did the entry-level version of a real, fast-growing California job.

A day in the life of a solar power technician - installing and tuning the same kind of cells you just measured, up on real roofs.

Solar Installer / Renewable Energy Technician

About $60,000 to $75,000 a year in California to start, and environmental engineers run about $90,000 to $110,000 a year.

Fast entry: a 1-year solar installer certificate (like Mt. SAC) or NABCEP entry-level cert gets you on a crew. Longer path: an EE or environmental engineering degree at a school like Cal State LA. Reading voltage and angling a panel for max output - exactly what you did today - is exactly what they do on the job.

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Share your work

Snap a photo of your notebook page (or your propeller spinning) and upload it to today's Padlet before you leave.

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Day 20: The Light Filter Challenge

Same sun, different colors -- can you find the light that makes your panel hit its peak?

⏱ Full day

SparkDoes Color Change the Power?10 min

Two colors of light, one solar panel. Bet your gut: which color makes more power?

How a solar panel turns light into power.

Your eyes love green. A panel might love red. Today you find out for real.

Hands-OnHunt for the Best LightMost of the day

Panel. Multimeter. Lamp. Colored filters. Your job: find the setup that makes the most power.

Keep your own data in your notebook - you decide what to measure, how to lay out your table, and what your results prove, like a real data scientist. Make it neat enough to show off.

⚠ Heads Up

Cover the WHOLE panel with each filter. Half-covered = junk readings.

Round 1 - Colors

Set your baselinePanel 30 cm from the lamp, no filter. Read the voltage. That's your 100 percent number -- write it big in your notebook.

Run every colorTape on RED, read it. Then GREEN, BLUE, YELLOW. One color at a time, full coverage, lamp stays put. Record each voltage in your notebook as you go.

Rank the winnersLine your colors up highest to lowest. Which one won? Did red surprise you?

Round 2 - Shade and Angle

Tilt and shadeNow chase the highest number in the room: tip the panel toward the lamp, try a slight angle, try a sliver of shade. Find your single best setup and log it.

Call the winnerin your notebook, fill in the % of Baseline column, circle the condition that won, and write one sentence: why you think it beat the rest.

CareerThis Is Someone's Job10 min

You just ran a spectral-response test -- the exact thing solar engineers do on every new panel.

A day in the life of a renewable energy engineer.

Photovoltaic Engineer / Energy Analyst

About $90,000 to $175,000 a year in California

They tune solar arrays to squeeze the most power out of real sunlight. First step from here: Sunrun's LA-based paid high school internship, then an Electrical or Mechanical Engineering track at Cal State LA or Cal Poly Pomona.

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Post your winning condition

Snap a photo of your notebook with the best light condition circled and upload it to today's Padlet before you leave.

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Day 21: Wind Power - Build a Better Blade

A blow dryer is your wind. Build the blade that grabs the most of it.

⏱ Full day

SparkWhat grabs the wind?10 min

Same air hits every blade. Why do some spin like crazy and some just sit there?

How a turbine turns wind into power. Watch the blades - shape, tilt, and number are exactly what you control today.

Up at the Tehachapi wind farm, thousands of turbines power 500,000 homes. Each blade is 200 feet long. Same physics as the little blade you are about to build.

Hands-OnDesign, blast, measure, beat itMost of the day

Build a blade set, blast it with a blow dryer, read the voltage, then change ONE thing and beat your own number.

Keep your own data in your notebook - you decide what to measure, how to lay out your table, and what your results prove, like a real data scientist. Make it neat enough to show off.

⚠ Heads Up

Blades spin FAST. Keep fingers clear when the blow dryer is on. Turn the dryer OFF before you touch the blades. Use the COOL/no-heat setting.

Round 1: Build your first blade set

Cut and mount bladesCut 3 blades from cardstock, each 10 cm long and 3 cm wide. Tape each one to the hub at about a 30-degree tilt. Keep them even so it doesn't wobble.

Wire it upPush the hub onto the little generator. Clip the generator to the multimeter and set it to DC volts.

Blast it and read the numberHold the turbine about 30 cm from the blow dryer. Turn the dryer on (cool setting). Watch the multimeter and write down the highest voltage you see. That's your baseline. Sketch this blade set and log the reading in your notebook.

Round 2: Change ONE thing, beat your number

Change the blade countSame length, same tilt - now try 2 blades, then 5 blades. Blast each one with the blow dryer. Record the voltage for each row in your notebook.

Change the tiltGo back to your best blade count. Now try a flat tilt (15 degrees) and a steep tilt (45 degrees). Blast each. Record each reading on your Test Log.

Build your championCombine the best blade count and best tilt you found. Blast it. Is it your highest number yet? If not, tweak and try again. Log your champion design and its winning voltage, then write one line on which design grabbed the most wind and why.

CareerPeople who build the real ones10 min

You just did the real job in miniature: tweak a blade, test it, find the design that grabs the most wind.

Wind Energy Engineer / Wind Turbine Technician

About $60,000 to $80,000 a year in California to start as a wind tech, and about $95,000 to $115,000 a year as a wind engineer - both grow fast.

Engineers design the blades and the wind farms. Techs climb the towers and keep them spinning. Two doors in: a Mechanical or Aerospace degree at Cal State LA, OR a 1-year Wind Energy cert at Mt SAC that hires right away. Tehachapi runs free public tours April-October - go stand under one.

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Post your champion blade

Snap a photo of your notebook page - sketch plus winning voltage - and upload it to today's Padlet before you leave.

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Day 22: AI as Your Design Partner

You and an AI team up to design a greener building for LA. You are the engineer. The AI is your sketch artist.

⏱ Full day

SparkCan AI Design a Greener City?15 min

Computer lab today. You type words to an AI and watch it draw a building.

An LA firm asked AI for 1,000 sketches of one transit hub. They picked 12. Three got built.

60-second look at the AI tool you will use today. Watch a few words turn into a design.

The AI is a great artist and a terrible engineer. It will draw a 100-story tower on a closet-sized base. Your job: spot what is real and what is fantasy.

Hands-OnDesign a Sustainable Building With AIMost of the day

Pair up at a computer. One screen, one mission: design a greener building for LA and make it actually buildable.

Keep your own data in your notebook - you decide what to measure, how to lay out your table, and what your results prove, like a real data scientist. Make it neat enough to show off.

⚠ Heads Up

Is today Friday? No computer lab today. Skip the AI - you become the architect by hand. Run the Friday version below, then bank the AI rendering for the next computer day and compare.

Friday Plan B - no computer lab

Friday version: sketch 3 fast iterations.In your notebook, draw the sustainable LA building 3 times. Each sketch fixes ONE engineering flaw from the last - turbine too small, solar facing the wrong way, no shade. Label the flaw you fixed each time.

Friday version: build a quick massing model.Grab cardstock or scrap paper. Fold and stack a fast block model of your best version. No detail, just the shape and the footprint. Make sure the base can actually hold the building.

Friday version: write the exact AI prompt.In your notebook, write the exact prompt you will run next computer day. Name the building, the city, and every green feature you want. This is the prompt you bank.

Next computer day: run it and compare.Run your banked prompt in gemini.google.com. Put the AI rendering next to your hand sketches and model. Write 1 thing you got right that the AI missed, and 1 thing the AI caught that you missed.

⚠ Heads Up

AI makes everything look possible. Your engineering brain is the filter. No filter, no real building.

Generate, Critique, Iterate

Sketch it firstin your notebook, sketch the building you want - apartments, a school, a transit hub. Write 1 thing you hope the AI nails.

Open the AI tool and prompt itGo to gemini.google.com (school account). Type: 'Architectural rendering of a 5-story sustainable apartment in Los Angeles with solar panels, wind turbines, and rainwater capture.' Wait for the image. Write that exact prompt in your notebook.

Hunt for 3 mistakesLook hard. Find 3 engineering problems. Turbines too tiny to power the place? Solar at the wrong angle for LA? No shade anywhere? Write all 3 in your notebook.

Make the AI fix oneAdd to your prompt to fix ONE mistake. Generate again. Did it actually fix it, or just make it prettier?

Run 3 rounds totalThree generations. For each round, log the prompt, the mistake you found, and whether the AI fixed it in your notebook. Watch the design get smarter as your prompts get sharper.

Lock in your best conceptPick your strongest version. in your notebook write your final prompt and one thing you would still change. You post this at the end.

CareerAI-Assisted Sustainable Design15 min

Real firms work exactly how you just did: AI sketches, humans decide what gets built.

A day in the life of someone designing the real thing, using tools like the one you just used.

Sustainable Design / AI-Assisted Civil Engineer

About $75,000 to $95,000 a year in California to start, and $150,000+ for senior engineers.

They design green buildings and transit that hit top sustainability standards, using AI to iterate faster. Path: civil engineering or architecture at Cal State LA, then an internship at an LA firm like Gensler or AECOM. The exact skill you used today - prompt, critique, iterate - is how they work.

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Post your best design

Snap a photo of your notebook and your final AI building, and upload to today's Padlet before you leave.

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Day 23: Let the AI Critique It

Your design looks great. Now hand it to an AI critic and watch it find the cracks you missed.

⏱ Full day

SparkWhat Would an Expert Tear Apart?10 min

Your prototype looks great. So what would an expert rip apart?

Top engineers spend more time deleting flaws than adding features. Today the AI is your critic. It is not attached to your work, so it will say the hard stuff.

Yesterday AI was the designer. Same tool, new job today: the critic.

Computer labFeed It to the CriticMost of the day

Computer lab. You and your partner pick ONE thing you built this week and put it on trial.

Keep your own data in your notebook - you decide what to measure, how to lay out your table, and what your results prove, like a real data scientist. Make it neat enough to show off.

⚠ Heads Up

Is today Friday? No computer lab today. Skip the Gemini steps and run the human critic panel below - same rubric, done by hand. Bank the AI critic round for your next computer day, then compare human flaws against AI flaws.

Friday Plan B - no computer lab

Friday version: swap artifacts with a partner team.No computers. Each team hands ONE artifact to another team. You are now the paid critic for their build, they are the critic for yours. Open a fresh page in your notebook.

Friday version: find 5 flaws by hand.Study the artifact like a real design review. Write 5 specific flaws. Tag each one PHYSICS, SCALE, SAFETY, COST, or MAINTENANCE, and point to the evidence on the build that makes you say it. No guessing, name what you see.

Friday version: hand it back, judge the judges.Read the 5 flaws written about YOUR build. For each, decide with your partner: REAL, HALLUCINATION, or NOT SURE. Trust your own measurements. Record each flaw, its tag, and your verdict.

Next computer day: run the AI round.Save your photo and your notebook critique. Next computer day, run the same artifact through Gemini and line up AI flaws against human flaws. Which critic caught more REAL ones?

Pick your one piece

Choose ONE artifact to critique.A photo of your wind turbine, your AI image from Day 22, your solar fan, or a clear design sketch. Snap the photo now if you need it. Write what you chose at the top of your notebook.

Put it on trial

Open Gemini and upload your image.gemini.google.com, sign in with your school account. Click the paper-clip icon and upload. The AI critiques the IMAGE, so do not describe it in words first.

Paste the critic prompt and send.Type: Critique this engineering design. Find at least 5 specific flaws. Tag each one PHYSICS, SCALE, SAFETY, COST, or MAINTENANCE, and say what in the image makes you say it.

Be the judge of the judge.Read all 5 flaws. For each, decide with your partner: REAL, HALLUCINATION, or NOT SURE. Trust your own measurements over the AI. Record each flaw, its tag, and your verdict in your notebook.

Attack the biggest real flaw.Ask: how would you fix this one flaw without redesigning the whole thing? Decide if the fix is realistic, then write your chosen fix on the log.

Flip it.Ask: what are 3 things this design does WELL? Real strengths, or generic praise? You decide.

Score the critic.Count how many of the 5 flaws were REAL. in your notebook, finish the line: out of every 10 AI critiques, how many should you actually act on?

⚠ Heads Up

AI invents flaws that are not there. Check every critique against the real data you collected this week.

CareerThe People Paid to Find the Flaws10 min

Some engineers get paid to find the crack before the customer does.

A reliability engineer at work. Finding flaws before launch is the whole job, and you just did it.

Quality Assurance / Reliability Engineer

About $80,000 to $145,000 a year in California. Entry-level QA roles run $80K to $100K; mid-career reliability engineers reach $110K to $145K.

They are the people who say no, you cannot ship that, and stop expensive recalls. Cal State LA's Industrial and Manufacturing Engineering BS is a direct route. First free step: a Six Sigma yellow-belt course online.

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Share your notebook

Snap a photo of your notebook page and upload it to today's Padlet before you leave.

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Day 24: Engineering Bootcamp - Pick Your Challenge

This week is not about redoing. It is about reimagining. Take what you know and engineer it better.

⏱ Full day

SparkBuild. Test. Improve.20 min

Engineers test, fail, and try again. That loop is the whole week.

A real engineer's day is mostly try, measure, try again. That is exactly the loop you run today - build it, test it, beat your own number.

Run the loop once, fast. Paper and tape only. Tallest free-standing tower in 20 minutes. Build it, stand it up, measure it, then improve and measure again. There is a class record. Go beat it.

Build version 1Paper and tape only - no other supplies. Make a tower that stands on its own. Set a timer. Go fast, do not overthink the first one.

Test and measureLet go. Does it stand on its own? Measure the height in centimeters and write it in your notebook as v1.

Improve and beat itChange ONE thing - a wider base, tighter rolls, a tripod. Rebuild, test, and measure again as v2. Did you beat your own number? Did you beat the class record? Write the record to chase on your sheet.

Hands-OnPick the challenge you take to Demo DayMost of the day

Six challenges. Each one reimagines something from this summer using only gear we already have. Your team picks ONE to take all the way to Demo Day.

Keep your own data in your notebook - you decide what to measure, how to lay out your table, and what your results prove, like a real data scientist. Make it neat enough to show off.

Capstone Challenge Menu

1 - Sphero Grand Prix

Design a brand-new obstacle course from the 3D-printed props and program a Sphero to clear it fastest.

2 - Sphero Arena

Turn the props - goals and ramps - into a Sphero sport: soccer or sumo. Engineer the strategy and the code to win.

3 - Drone Precision Delivery

Engineer a lightweight payload and a release, then fly an accuracy mission to hit a target.

4 - Solar Power Record

Using the panels and multimeters, engineer the highest-output rig - angle, wiring, reflectors made from what is on hand - and beat the class record.

5 - Wind Turbine Showdown

Redesign your blades from the existing materials and blow dryers to beat the Week 5 output record.

6 - Free-Build Invention

Combine any gear you already have to solve a problem your team picks, then prove it works.

PICK ONE CHALLENGEAs a team, circle ONE of the six in your notebook. Say it out loud to each other so it is locked in. This is the one you carry to Demo Day.

SKETCH YOUR FIRST IDEADraw your first idea in the sketch box. Label the parts and how it works. It does not have to be right - it has to be a starting point you can build and test.

LIST THE GEAR YOU ALREADY HAVEWrite down every piece you will pull from the lab: the Sphero and 3D-printed props, the drone, panels and multimeters, wind blades and a blow dryer, plus classroom supplies - paper, tape, cardboard, string, markers. Use only what we already have.

SET YOUR NUMBER TO BEATWrite the one result your team will prove on Demo Day - fastest time, most volts, most hits, tallest, or 'it works.' That is your record to chase all week.

⚠ Heads Up

Same safety rules as all summer: clear flight zones for the drones, keep fingers clear of spinning blades and turn the blow dryer OFF before you touch them, no loose hair or sleeves near moving parts.

CareerEngineers fail, then try again10 min

Nobody nails it on the first build. Real engineers test, fail, and try again - and that is exactly what you started today.

A day in the life of someone designing the real thing - the same build, test, improve loop you just ran on your tower.

Design Engineer

About $75,000 to $120,000 a year in California

They pick a challenge, build a first version, test it, find what failed, and rebuild it better - the same loop you ran today, just bigger.

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Post your pick and your first sketch

Snap a photo of your notebook page - tower height, the challenge you circled, and your first sketch - and upload it to today's Padlet before you leave.

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Day 25: Design and Build

New week, new challenge. Pick your mission, sketch it, and build Version 1 today.

⏱ Full day

SparkA Great Build Starts Rough10 min

Nobody builds a champion on the first try.

This week is one big engineering challenge. Teams take a mission, then design, build, test, and improve toward Demo Day in front of Cal State LA guests.

Today is all about the rough first try. You sketch a real design, build Version 1 from gear you already have, run the first test, and write down your score. Version 1 is supposed to be rough. That is the point. Tomorrow you make it better.

Friendly competition starts now. Every challenge has a record to beat and a champion to crown.

Hands-OnPick a Challenge, Build Version 1Most of the day

Choose your challenge. Then sketch, build, and run your first test.

Keep your own data in your notebook - you decide what to measure, how to lay out your table, and what your results prove, like a real data scientist. Make it neat enough to show off.

Capstone Challenge Menu

Sphero Grand Prix

Design a brand-new obstacle course from the 3D-printed props - cones, ramps, gates - then program a Sphero to clear it in the fastest time. Score: course time.

Sphero Arena

Turn the goals and ramps into a Sphero sport: soccer or sumo. Engineer your strategy and your code to win the match. Score: goals scored or rounds won.

Drone Precision Delivery

Engineer a lightweight payload and a release, then fly an accuracy mission to drop it on a target. Score: target hits.

Solar Power Record

Using the panels and multimeters, engineer the highest-output rig - angle, wiring, and reflectors made from what is on hand. Score: volts or output. Beat the class record.

Wind Turbine Showdown

Redesign your blades from the existing materials and test them on the blow dryers. Score: volts or output. Beat the Week 5 record.

Free-Build Invention

Combine any gear you already have to solve a problem your team picks. Then prove it works. Score: your own success measure.

PREDICT - SKETCH THE REAL DESIGNin your notebook, draw your design and label every part: what each piece is and what it does. Then write your prediction - a real score with its unit, and one reason you think you will hit it.

GATHER THE GEAR YOU ALREADY HAVEPull only from what is in the lab: Sphero and the 3D-printed props, a drone, solar panels and multimeters, wind blades and a blow dryer, plus paper, tape, cardboard, string, and markers. Gather it all before you start.

BUILD VERSION 1Build the rough first try. Code your Sphero or drone in the block-coding app you already used. Wire your rig. Cut and tape your blades or payload. Done is better than perfect today.

TEST - RUN THE FIRST TESTRun it. Time the course, count the hits or goals, read the volts on the multimeter, or measure the distance. Run it twice so you trust the number.

RECORD - WRITE YOUR SCOREWrite your first score in your notebook in the right unit for your challenge: course time, goals scored, target hits, volts or output, distance, or your own success measure. This is the number you will beat tomorrow.

⚠ Heads Up

Same safety rules as all summer: goggles for any cutting, clear flight zones for drones, no loose hair or sleeves near spinning blades or wheels.

CareerInventors Build to Learn8 min

Real engineers love a rough first try - it tells them exactly what to fix.

The engineering design process in under four minutes - the same predict, build, test, record loop you ran today.

Inventor and Prototype Engineer

About $80,000 to $120,000 a year in California

They sketch an idea, build a quick first version, test it, and use what failed to design the next one - exactly the loop you started today.

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Share your work

Snap a photo of your notebook page and upload it to today's Padlet before you leave.

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Day 26: Test, Fail, Improve

Your Version 1 has a weak point. Find it, fix one thing, and beat your score.

⏱ Full day

SparkFailure Is Data10 min

Your build broke somewhere yesterday. Good. That is the most useful thing that happened.

Every champion build on Demo Day got tested, failed, and got fixed first. Failure is not the end of the project. It is the data that tells you exactly what to change next.

Today's mission: stress-test your Version 1 until you find the ONE weak point, change ONE thing, build Version 2, and beat your Version 1 score. Records are made to be broken, starting with your own.

A real engineer's day is mostly try, break, measure, try again. That loop is the whole job, and it is exactly what you run today.

Hands-OnFind the Flaw, Build V2Most of the day

Break it on purpose, change one thing, rebuild, and retest. Write every number in your notebook.

Keep your own data in your notebook - you decide what to measure, how to lay out your table, and what your results prove, like a real data scientist. Make it neat enough to show off.

⚠ Heads Up

Spinning props and flying parts. Keep fingers clear of drone propellers and turbine blades, eyes up when anything is in the air, and clear a landing zone before every drone or Sphero run.

Pick Your Challenge

Sphero Grand Prix

Design a brand-new obstacle course from the 3D-printed cones and ramps, then program your Sphero to clear it in the fastest time.

Sphero Arena

Turn the printed goals and ramps into a Sphero sport, soccer or sumo. Engineer the strategy and the code to win the match.

Drone Precision Delivery

Engineer a lightweight payload and a release from paper, tape, and string, then fly an accuracy mission to hit your target.

Solar Power Record

Use the panels and multimeters to engineer the highest-output rig, angle, wiring, and reflectors made from what is on hand, and beat the class record.

Wind Turbine Showdown

Redesign your blades from the existing blade materials and test them on the blow dryers to beat the Week 5 output record.

Free-Build Invention

Combine any gear your team already has to solve a problem you pick, then prove it works with real numbers.

Run the Loop

Find the flawStress-test your Version 1. Run it hard until it fails, then name the ONE weakest point: the Sphero clipping a cone, the payload missing the target, a loose solar wire, a blade that stalls. Write where it failed and why in your notebook.

Redesign one changeChoose the single change you think fixes that weak point. Just one. Write it down and your reason before you touch anything. Change three things and you will never know which fix actually worked.

Rebuild Version 2Make that one change and build your Version 2. Same gear, same challenge, one improvement. Keep your Version 1 around so you can compare.

Retest and beat your scoreRun both versions the same way every time, at least 3 trials each, same distance, same payload, same dryer setting, same multimeter spot. Record all the numbers. Did Version 2 beat Version 1? The data decides, not your gut.

⚠ Heads Up

Change ONE thing at a time. It is the whole rule of today. One change, one retest, then the next.

CareerReal Engineers Iterate10 min

Nobody nails it on Version 1. The people who change the world just iterate faster than everyone else.

Engineer / Inventor

About $85,000 to $150,000 a year in California, more with experience.

Every great invention is a stack of failed versions that got one change better each time. The engineers who win are the ones who test, learn from the break, and build the next version. That is exactly the loop you ran today.

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Snap a photo of your notebook page and your Version 2 build, then upload it to today's Padlet before you leave.

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Day 27: Build the Booth & Dry Run

You get 90 seconds and 3 feet of table to make a guest care.

⏱ Full day

Spark90 Seconds, 3 Feet10 min

Tomorrow, Cal State LA guests walk the room. Today you build the booth that stops them.

Here is the rule: 90 seconds and 3 feet of table. That is all you get to make a stranger care about what your team built this week. A wall of words won't do it. A loud title, your best score, and a live demo they can touch will.

Your challenge this week pulled from one of these. Your booth is about THIS build.

1. Sphero Grand Prix

A brand-new obstacle course built from the 3D-printed cones and ramps, with a Sphero programmed to clear it fastest. Best score = fastest clean run.

2. Sphero Arena

The goals and ramps turned into a Sphero sport, soccer or sumo. Best score = goals scored or rounds won, plus the code and strategy behind it.

3. Drone Precision Delivery

A lightweight payload and release you engineered, flown on an accuracy mission. Best score = hits on target out of total drops.

4. Solar Power Record

Panels, multimeters, angle, wiring, and reflectors made from what's on hand. Best score = highest output in volts that beat the class record.

5. Wind Turbine Showdown

Redesigned blades, same materials and blow dryers, aimed at beating the Week 5 output record. Best score = your output vs the record.

6. Free-Build Invention

Any gear you already have, combined to solve a problem your team picked. Best score = the proof that it actually works.

Hands-OnBuild It, Then Run It LiveMost of the day

Build the booth. Write the pitch. Run it on real people. Fix the weak spot.

Grab your gear and your notebook. Everything gets written by hand today.

Part I - Build the Booth

Make the big titleOne bold sign a guest can read from across the room. Markers, paper, tape, cardboard. If they can't read it in 2 seconds from 10 feet away, make it bigger.

Post the challenge in one lineWhat did your team set out to do? One sentence on a card next to the title. Write it on your planner first, then make the sign.

Show your best scoreYour number and its unit, big: fastest seconds, most volts, most hits, most goals, grams lifted. The number is your proof. Put it where a guest's eyes land.

Set up the live demoThe thing a guest can actually try or watch right now at your 3-foot table. Run the Sphero, drop the drone payload, spin the turbine, read the multimeter. Set the gear so it works on the first try, every time.

Part II - Write the 90-Second Pitch

Outline it on your plannerSix beats: the hook, the challenge you took on, how you designed and built it, what broke and how you improved it, your best score said out loud, then the invite: 'Want to try it?' Short lines. You are talking, not reading.

A 60-second confidence reset before you pitch - shake out the nerves, then go.

Part III - The Dry Run

Half present, half visitOne half of the room stands at their booths and pitches. The other half walks around as guests, watches the 90-second pitch, and tries the live demo.

Give 2 stars and 1 wishVisitors, at each booth say 2 stars - two things that worked - and 1 wish - one thing to fix. Booth teams, write all of it on your planner. Don't argue, just collect it.

SwapSwitch roles. The presenters become the guests, the guests become the presenters. Run every booth again so everyone pitches and everyone gives feedback.

⚠ Heads Up

Time it for real. If your pitch runs past 90 seconds, cut a line. A guest will walk away before minute two.

Part IV - Polish the Weak Spot

Fix the one thingLook at your 2 stars and 1 wish. Pick the single weakest spot - a confusing line, a demo that misfired, a title nobody could read - and fix it before you leave. Write what you changed on your planner. That is your edge for Demo Day.

CareerEngineers Pitch Too10 min

The best build still has to be sold. Engineers pitch their work all the time.

Engineer / Inventor

About $85,000 to $150,000 a year in California, more with experience.

Great engineers don't just build, they get up and make people care in a couple of minutes: investors, judges, a whole team. The 90-second pitch you just ran is the exact skill they use to get a project funded and built. You did the real thing today.

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Share your booth

Snap a photo of your notebook page and your booth, then upload it to today's Padlet before you leave.

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Day 28: Demo Day

Today you are the engineer. Set up your booth, welcome the Cal State LA guests, run your build live in rotating rounds, crown some friendly champions, and celebrate an incredible summer.

⏱ Full day

SparkToday You Are the Engineer10 min

All week you took a challenge, designed it, built it, tested it, and improved it. Today real guests from Cal State LA walk in - and you get to show them what you made.

A 60-second reset before doors open. You already did the hard part.

A demo is not a speech. It is you, standing next to a thing you engineered, pressing go and letting it work. Three beats: HOOK (one line on the challenge you took), SHOW (run it live - the Sphero clears the course, the drone hits the target, the meter jumps), FINISH (the one thing you changed to make it better).

Find your challenge below. This is the build you are running at your booth today - your final score, your v1-to-v2 story, your record to defend.

Sphero Grand Prix

Your obstacle course from the 3D-printed cones and ramps. Run your program live and show off your fastest clean time.

Sphero Arena

Your Sphero sport built from the goals and ramps - soccer or sumo. Demo the strategy and the code that wins.

Drone Precision Delivery

Your lightweight payload and release. Fly the accuracy mission and try to hit the target on demand for the guests.

Solar Power Record

Your panel rig - angle, wiring, and reflectors made from what you had. Read the multimeter live and show your record output.

Wind Turbine Showdown

Your redesigned blades. Fire up the blow dryer and show the output that beat the Week 5 record.

Free-Build Invention

The build your team combined from the gear you already had. Name the problem, then prove your invention solves it.

Hands-OnBooths Open, Demos Live, Champions CrownedMost of the day

Set up, welcome your guests, then run your demo in rotating rounds so everyone gets to present and everyone gets to watch. Keep your notebook with you the whole time - that is where your final score, proudest moment, and guest signature go.

Set Up Your Booth

Build your stationSet out your gear so it is ready to run on the first try - your course laid out, your drone charged, your panel angled, your blades on. Put your notebook on the table and write your challenge name big so guests know what they are looking at.

Welcome your guestsWhen a Cal State LA guest steps up, give them your one-line hook first: the challenge you took and the record you were chasing. Then invite them in - 'Want to see it run?'

⚠ Heads Up

Run a quiet test before doors open. If your demo only works sometimes, that is normal engineering - have a backup move ready (your v1, a photo, or a slower run) so you are never stuck in front of a guest.

Rotating Demo Rounds

Half the room runs their booths while the other half visits and tries the builds. Then swap, so everyone presents and everyone gets to be a guest at someone else's station.

1 - Hook it

Open with your one line. Name your challenge and the record you went after. Watch the guest lean in.

2 - Show it live

Press go. Run the course, fly the mission, read the meter, spin the turbine. Let it work in front of them.

3 - Let them try

Hand it over. Let a guest drive the Sphero, set the panel angle, or launch a run - and beat your score if they can.

4 - Then swap

Presenters become visitors. Go try the other builds and cheer for the runs you watch.

Crown the Champions

Friendly challenge-offsWithin each challenge, run a quick head-to-head: fastest Grand Prix time, most drone hits, highest solar or wind output, the Arena bracket. Log the winning numbers and crown a champion per challenge. Records that get beaten today go on the board.

Fill in your cardWrite your final score, your v1-vs-v2 story, your proudest build moment, and the best question a guest asked you. Ask one guest to sign your notebook before they leave your booth.

Celebrate the Summer

Take it all inWalk the room one last time. Six weeks ago some of these tools were brand new to you. Today you ran a live demo for university guests. Find a teammate, swap a high five, and snap a photo of your card.

CareerYou Are a Builder Now10 min

Engineers and inventors do exactly what you did this summer: take a challenge, build something real, test it, make it better, and show the world it works. That is not a someday thing - you did it today.

Engineer / Inventor

About $80,000 to $130,000 a year in California

Every gadget, robot, and clean-energy rig started as someone's first messy build. You now know the whole loop - design, build, test, improve, demo. Keep building.

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Share your work

Snap a photo of your notebook page and upload it to today's Padlet before you leave. Last upload of the summer - make it a good one.

↗ On a computer? Open the Padlet board to upload

Built by Woven Learning & Technology✎ Edit