Some kids are basketball players or cheerleaders or thespians.
Some build bots.
Competition was fierce Saturday at the Oklahoma Regional Botball Tournament, held at Science Museum Oklahoma.
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Twenty-two middle and high school teams from Oklahoma, Texas and Kansas let their robots battle it out for points.
At the end of the day, the robot built by Southwest Covenant School of Yukon was declared the best "bot” around. Second place went to DeWitt Middle School of Carrollton, Texas, and Whittier Middle School of Norman took third.
Sixth-graders Adiba Khan and Supriya Sridhar, members of an all-girl team from Whittier Middle School in Norman, said they've been working on their robot every day after school for months — some days until 5:30 p.m., other days until 8 p.m.
Adiba said she participates in the robotics program because she wants to be an engineer; Supriya joined the botball team to learn how computers work.
Their team wore purple T-shirts printed with the phrase, "Botgirls Rule,” to Saturday's tournament.
Members of the team from Moore West Junior High School competed for the first time Saturday. Leigh Smith, a ninth-grader, said once her team arrived at the tournament, they got lots of ideas to make their robot even better.
"I've never done anything like this before,” she said. "It was a whole new horizon.”
How to play Botball
The bots are not remote controlled but instead are programmed before the competition. A robot scores points for pushing colored balls and other obstacles into certain areas of the game board, acquiring points for each action.
Teams have practice boards, identical to the ones at the tournament, to use for practice.
Smith said her team used a lot of trial and error to get the timing right.
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Garrett Sickles, an eighth-grade student at Alcott Middle School in Norman, waits for his robot to come to life Saturday at a regional Botball Tournament at the Science Museum Oklahoma. BY STEVE SISNEY, THE OKLAHOMAN
To know more
For more information about Botball, go to www.bot ball.org or contact KISS Institute at 579-4609.
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