Week 6: Robots in Motion in the Ocean
About 70 percent of the earth’s surface is covered by oceans yet so much of it hasn’t been explored. This lesson is going to introduce you to the robots of the ocean. You will need to do a lot of research and become familiar with the types of robots and the jobs they are set out to do. At the end of the lesson you will try to design your own robot to do a job you learned about or even a job no one has thought about. Who knows, you might invent a new robot or maybe use this robot in the BEST competition of Current Events.
What can an oceanic robot do?
First – Brainstorm all the things a robot in the ocean could do. List any kind of work it could perform.
Then watch this video on WHAT ARE OCEAN ROBOTS
Now time for some Research. Use the internet and find as many different ways robots can be used in our oceans.
Resources:
A Blast from the Past: Exploring the Titanic
“Hi, my name is Angus and I was one of the robots used in 1985 and 1986 on the sunken Titanic expedition”
Learn more about ANGUS and the Titanic expedition.
Make your own introduction to Ocean exploration. Time to get creative. If you want to make a video you can and send it to bestology@bestinc.org. It could get published on the BEST YouTube site!
Getting more specific about the Pacific
Lesson 5 was all about plastic in the ocean. We focused on one man and his project to clean up plastic in the Pacific Ocean. Let’s take a look at other robots and companies that are getting involved.
We need to clean up the Pacific garbage patch. Let’s look at how robots are involved in this project.
1. World’s Largest Ocean Plastic Garbage Cleaning System – “The Ocean Cleanup”
2. Sea Vax
3. Underwater robot cleans ocean trash
4. NOAA – Marine Debris Program
Community Connection:
Now that you are more aware of the Great Pacific garbage patch and how robots are involved in the cleanup, sit down and discuss ways how you as a robotics cub can contribute to this awareness and even help in the project locally. Make it real by contacting your local council and tell them you want to help.
BEST Connection:
Look at your BEST kit, find a robot that you were interested in while doing your research, see if you can match parts of the BEST kit to parts that could be used on the robot you found.
Now try this extended challenge:
- Design a robot on paper, as neat or as rough as you want and explain what this robot will be doing. What its function will be.
- Now consider only items from the BEST kit to build your robot. Do you think it could be possible to build this robot?
Bloom’s Taxonomy: add, create, explore, evaluate, generate, include, identify, list, observe, reflect, review, subdivide, use, and write
Workforce Skills: critical thinking, materials evaluation, reading comprehension, science, writing