Kids built their own robots at the Southwest Regional Library on Saturday, Nov. 5.
Kids have the opportunity to participate once a month in the program at the Southwest Library branch, but the event is also offered at five other branches.
Christina Garcia, a library assistant and special projects, said the kids that come for Robotics to not need any experience and get to work with over 500 pieces.
“We have everything that they need, the pieces and software,” Garcia said. “They program [the robotic model] themselves.”
Garcia said the program is currently offered to kids from 13 to 17 years old during the fall and 10 to 17 years old during the summer.
“Hopefully in the future, we will drop down the ages a little bit lower to the ages of 10 to 17 for the spring,” Garcia said. “We take this program to lots of different branches.”
Garcia said it takes the kids about 30 minutes to build the driving base and it can take up to an hour to program the robot, depending on how extensive the kids want to use the software.
“If they want to just program it to move forward and backward, that process takes about 45 minutes,” Garcia said. “We usually encourage them to do more complicated and advance programming, so they can add in other movements, add sound effects [and] sensors.”
Garcia said the Fort Worth Library staff see a need for teaching kids how to have fun with science, technology, engineering, and math disciplines.
“It’s just one more way that the library can help do that in the community,” she said.
Families interested in science, technology, engineering and mathematics can also go to the Panther Lab marketspace located at the Northwest Branch Library.
According to a Fort Worth Library flyer, people can do a variety of things from 3D printing, circuitry, robotics, video creation and coding at the panther lab.
Families do not have to live in Fort Worth or have a library card to access the Panther Lab, according to a Fort Worth Library flyer.
Families will have one more chance to participate this fall in robotics on Saturday, Dec. 3, but will need to register for the event.