VEX EDR Curriculum is divided up into 12 primary Units and 1 optional Unit. Students will start off learning about engineering and engineering problem solving. They will be given introductions to the VEX Robotics Design System and Autodesk® Inventor®. In Unit 5 students will be presented with an engineering challenge; they will need to build a robot to play a sport-like game. After this, the rest of the curriculum walks students through the design of their robot while presenting them with relevant STEM and Robotics principles. At the end of the course, students compete head-to-head with their robots.
This curriculum provides resources to help guide teachers and students through the robotics build and competition process. Everything is included so even a completely inexperienced teacher or student can be successful.
This curriculum isn’t designed around any specific competition game. The lessons learned and concepts described apply equally to a robot being built for an in-classroom game, and to a robot being built to play at the VEX Robotics Competition World Championship. Teachers have the option to structure their course in a variety of different ways, built around the excitement of a competition robotics project.
The curriculum is heavily focused on mechatronic principles; as such, programming is NOT required. However this course is structured in such a way that teachers and students who want to include a more Computer Science heavy layer with the course can do so. For information on the programming options available, consult www.vexrobotics.com/programming/
Structure:
The curriculum is divided up into three main sections: Curriculum Lesson Content, Appendices, and Teacher Materials.
The Curriculum Lesson Content not only includes material teaching the topic being covered, but also ties this material into the students’ course-long project. Each unit ends with students completing some activity which will link the knowledge they just learned to their robotic build; a real-world application.
The Appendices include information that supplements the VEX EDR Curriculum. It includes information on aspects of the VEX Robotics Design System not directly covered in the curriculum, and technical resources to help users setup & troubleshoot their robot's control system.
The Teacher Materials section contains materials to help teachers implement the VEX EDR Curriculum in their classroom. It includes detailed lesson plans for each of the 13 units, assessment tools, standards mapping, as well as other resources necessary to help structure a successful STEM class.
Users who are "new" to robotics competition can find several documents to help them get started in their classroom, or on the world stage!
The Lesson Plans found in the Teacher Materials include all the information a teacher needs to organize their class and structure their course.
The Lesson Plan for each unit includes:
- Prerequisites
- Concepts Addressed
- Learning Objectives
- STEM Connections
- Materials Needed
- Key Terminology
- The Day-to-Day Lesson Plan
- “Seed Questions” to help students with their engineering notebook entries