Heading into our last week of class, we started the Lego Mindstorms© portion of our course. We started off by giving them half an hour or so to just play with the pieces, since most of them have never played with Lego before. They were all very excited and requested more time to play with them. We then started the built-in Mindstorms© tour. Since the computers did not have speakers, we tried to run the tour on the projector with the one set of speakers we had. It turned out to be too hard to follow along on their own computers, so we ended up just teaching them directly. We showed them how the sensors worked, and how to program with the RCX code, instead of having them go through the 'training center.' Then we ended the day with the first assignment: Make a robot that reverses/turns around when it hits a wall. The second day, we decided the class needed some engineering skills, so we gave them a quick blurb on gear/power ratio and how to make a secure robot with supports. We first had them build a robot that could hold an object securely as far out as possible. Then there was a class competition. The next project was to build a robot that moved as slowly as possible, and had the most power. Again, a competition followed. We also gave them some short programming assignments to get them used to the RCX coding. We woke early up on Wednesday morning (actually, it was much earlier than morning, we woke at five a.m.) to take a field trip to Shanghai Number Three Girls' School for the math conference. Xu Kan, a Chinese mathematician who researches in France, came and spoke about his project that he has been working on, WIMS (WWW Interactive Mathematics Server). He showed us some of the uses (like solving linear systems) as well as some fun and games. Then each of the three schools (No. 3 Girls' School, Jiao Tong High School, and Shanghai Experimental) gave presentations on the web sites that they had made. Since the bus ride back was not so short, we didn't get back until late afternoon, and gave the class some recreation time with the Lego for the remaining part of the day. There was a big soccer game between Manchester United and the Shanghai team that night. We heard about it from the students, and it was pretty hyped. Since the students who lived at the dormitories do not have TV, we invited fourteen students to watch the game with us in our room. We took them out to dinner and with a supply of snacks (apparently not enough) we watched the game. It made for quite a scene, but all the students had a lot of fun. We never knew there could be so much excitement in watching soccer on TV. It becomes very amusing when you hear fourteen people gasping, booing, cheering, etc. at just about every move on the field. Thursday morning, while Reid went to school at the usual time, Hesky and Roger set out to find materials for the robot competition 'field.' We had decided on a competition where the students would have to collect Ping-Pong balls from the center and bring them to their own end zone. We also threw in a black circle that would earn them extra points if they were on it when time ran out. Luckily, in our search for material we came across a very friendly carpenter who was doing some furnishing at a nearby restaurant. He showed us a place to get the wood we needed, and also offered to cut the wood to the right lengths. He seemed very interested when we told him that we were using it for teaching. We found just the right size platform (eight by four feet) and boards for the walls. The worker then cut the boards and nailed them to the platform for us. Our next goal was to find a way to transport this grand construction to school. As we were lugging it to the bus stop, wondering if it would fit through the door, a 'tricycle-moped' stopped us and asked if we need a ride. We had our doubts that it would even fit, but the guy was already loading the thing onto his cart. It took quite a while to fit it on. He had to take apart a good chunk of his cart, and while doing so, attracted a pretty good crowd, which kept shaking their heads saying that it would not fit. Finally, he got it to stay, with half of it hanging out the back, but we figured it'd be easier than trying to squeeze it onto a bus. We crossed our fingers, got onto the tricycle, and eventually wound up at the school safe and sound, our board included. Reid had already given the students the specifications of the playing field, so they were busily designing their robots. Hesky spent the rest of the day painting the platform. We gave the students Friday morning to finish up on their creations, and also run test runs on the course. Hu laoshi even brought his wife and just turned three months old daughter to watch the first Lego robotics competition in China. Right after lunch, we started our tournament. Like all fair tournaments, there were two rounds. The first round determined seedings for each team, so that in the real competition, the best two teams would not go against each other in the first round. After the seedings, we gave the students half and hour to make some last minute changes, as there were a few teams who ran into last minute bugs. Then the real thing began. It was quite exciting, and all the students were pretty into it. We made sure to capture the tournament on the Sharp camcorder, with credits to anchorman Reid. Finally, WindWing proved its superiority. We kind of just stood there, not believing that three weeks had just passed. As the students packed up and cleaned up, we said our last good-byes and took some last minute pictures. It turned out to be quite a sad moment for everyone. All in all, Jiao Tong high school was great. The only drawback was that there was no way for students to surf the web, but we were able to do a bit of that a Children's Palace the previous week. The network was very useful, Hu laoshi was very supportive, and above all, it was the students that made for such a great experience. Whether it was teaching us how to say mathematical terms in Chinese, playing basketball, making loud noises in our room, or making fun of Reid as he grimaced at his chou (stinky) tofu, the students were generally fun to be around. This adventure will always have a fond place in our memories. We can't help but wonder what Children's Palace will be like.