At a MerseySTEM organised robotics event held at Liverpool College, Mosslands School ended up being beaten finalists!  In the qualifying rounds both teams representing the school emerged undefeated which included a tense derby battle between Mosslands A and B teams which ended in a 1-1 draw.  Once the qualifying rounds were over both teams were entered into the semi-final playoffs.  It was at this stage that Mosslands A suffered their only loss. Mosslands A team comprised Ben Harding10F1, Reece O’Neill 10R1 Callum Williams 10F2 and Leighton Speed 10R2.  However, Mosslands B triumphantly overcame their semi-final opponents beating Woodchurch to reach the final.  Unfortunately Mosslands B fell at the final hurdle losing the final in what had been a demanding battle to Wirral Grammar boys.

A pupils  story:-

On the 7^th of October we went to Liverpool for a STEM activity day of Robotics.  My team consisted of myself (Jacob Taylor 10F2), Harvey Campbell 10G2, Joe Gordon 10R1 and Cameron Prayle 10R1 and we had a great day.  We started the day with an introduction to Robotics and learnt why robots are better than people in certain jobs that we find repetitive or dangerous.  Then we had to create a robot that could collect balls and put them into a basket.  

After two hours in construction we had created our working robot.  Once we were given a controller we started testing.  I was the controller of Betty (the nickname of our robot), it went well but we got the wires in the wrong slots!  The forwards motion was backwards and so on but we had no time to correct this.  Our team went on first; our match was against the other Mosslands group.  It was an incredible game as our grabber stopped functioning, but we got a ball in via spinning and getting the ball locked into the claw of the robot. We then had to hit the basket until it came out and the goal was awarded.  The score was 1-1.  After checking “Betty” we discovered that a link had disconnected.  Once again we fixed this problem, then it was victory after victory earning a total of 10 points before the semis.

Our strategy was plain and simple, get the red ball (three points) before the opposition got one.  It worked and won us most of our games.  We made some friends too who were also competing and the people in general were nice and friendly Our team won our semis with an 8-7 victory.  The final was a heated battle from the start.  We got the red ball first but the other team were too fast and very systematic at grabbing the ball with ease.  Unfortunately they beat us 10-7 even after our 3 point head start.  All in all it was a fantastic event organised by MerseySTEM and me and the team thought it was a fun educational, thought provoking day, that made me think, “should I go into the wonderful world of robotics?”

Jacob Taylor.    Mosslands School Wirral.