Penpol Pumpkins

Here’s a short vlog sharing what we’ve been up to on day 3 of this American Adventure, as told by the Pumpkins!

This is Polar Park, home of the Worcester Red Sox, and as part of the competition every team was invited to a watch a match as part of a special Robotics Night.

The eagle eyed readers might notice the distinct lack of players on the pitch… that’s because rain sadly stopped play and the match was postponed! We still got to enjoy some hotdogs, nacho hats, and some great fireworks though!

We’ve only been here two hours and already the Pumpkins have been dancing with the Brazilian team, Reading badges with a team from Greece, getting Robot Games tips from the “home” team and posing for photographs with all their new friends.

Below we have the Goofy Gyros from Massachusetts, Panther Power from New Jersey, Wild Cat Coders from California, Team Bob from Greece and Say What?!? from Alabama.

Is there an award for “Most Orange Team Area”? If not, there definitely should be!!

After a hearty breakfast and some sing-a-long Pokémon lullabies on the tv (don’t ask!) we are finally headed to the competition itself in Worcester.

Today is a chance to set up our Pit Area, practice the Robot Games and meet all the other teams. It’s also a chance for the staff to unveil their own special “Honorary Pumpkin” t-shirts!

Today the Pumpkins were set a challenge – to get a selfie with an American flag in an unusual location.  You might need to zoom in on some of them!

Extra challenge – can you spot the person who accidentally deleted theirs and then hastily had to use CapCut to hastily make a new one? 😂

Here’s a short vlog sharing what we’ve been up to on day 2 of this American Adventure, as told by the Pumpkins!

This afternoon we were fortunate enough to have an awesome guided tour of Fenway park where we were able to learn all about the history of the stadium, how it’s evolved over time and how they’re using modern technology to grow their own food to use in the restaurants on site – they even have a computerised irrigation system to help their crops grow.

“Fenway Park was really interesting because there were so many thing that we were shown, and they all had meaning and we learnt about them in detail. I understand baseball now!” – Ethan

“My favourite part of the tour was going to the highest stands called the Green Monster, and we sat in the same chairs that the celebrities sit in when they come to watch a RedSox game” – James B

Our morning activity today was focussed around the two Core Values of Teamwork and Fun – and what better place to combine the two than the LEGO Discovery Center in Boston?

Here the Pumpkins explored many different worlds of LEGO, from the Space Land where they built rockets and sent them off into cyberspace to the Builders Workshop where the students got to work with Shaun the Master Model Builder to create their own mini figure-scale scenes.

They even combined forces to turn a giant LEGO mountain build into an orangey “Pumpkin Kingdom”!!

We’re on the way to our first stop of the day at the LEGO Discovery Center and that means our first taste of public transport in Massachusetts – the T line.

“When we got off the first train it was really stinky smelling underground! We’re on the Orange line now and that’s really pumpkiny!” – Jenna