Creating your own robot instructions

Objectives

• Give precise and unambiguous instructions
• Create and debug simple programs
• Use logical reasoning to predict the behaviour of simple programs

Resources

Teacher Presentation

Recap the last lesson where the students were asked to come up with precise instructions to create an algorithm for the robot teacher to make a jam sandwich. What sort of things did we have to think about with our instructions? Where did we make mistakes? How did we make sure our instructions were precise?

Explain that they are going to create their own instruction sheet this week for another task that the robot needs to be programmed for. For example:

• Building a simple model with bricks, duplo etc
• Changing from school shoes to PE shoes
• Brushing your teeth
• Washing their hands

Ask them to work in pairs to first think through how to do their task, and put in order possible instructions. Then swap their instructions with another group and evaluate each others’; is there enough detail? are they clear? Do they leave room for error?

Then they should identify the keywords that they need to include on their instructions card, for example, for brushing your teeth:

• toothbrush
• handle
• bristles
• left hand
• right hand
• tap
• lift
• pick up
• hold
• up
• down
• push
• toothpaste
• cap
• squeeze
• rinse
• water

Ask them to try and arrange them a bit like the sandwich making cards with right hand and left hand first, then verbs (action words), then nouns (objects), so it’s easier for people to create their algorithms.

A table for brushing your teeth might look a bit like this