The Coaches’ Handbook and DVDs (purchased with registration) help guide your team. To help get you started and answer some of the questions you may have, here are the first few chapters from the Handbook. They will give you a great basis to start with including advice for coaches, tips on team dynamics, what resources are necessary, and a sample budget with suggestions on fundraising!  

Chapter 1: What is this All About?
Chapter 2: Building a Team
Chapter 3: Building a Season

Important Note on Child Safety

FLL Products

Video tutorials on all the FLL products sold through the FLL team registration system (US/Canadian teams)

Table Construction

Official table building instructions
Looking for a lighweight, portable table option? FLL team, The Inventioneers, created the STOW-or-GO Practice Table

Stories from Our Community - FLL Blog

Official FLL correspondents report from the field!

Fundraising

• fundraising-ideas.org - Loads of fundraising ideas
• fundraiserhelp.com - Fundraising ideas and resources
• stepbystepfundraising.com

General Engineering & Career Resources

• jets.org - Junior Engineering Technical Society
• robotics.nasa.gov - NASA Robotics Alliance Project
• kids.gov - lots of links with career information for children
• engineergirl.org - Created by the National Academy of Engineering
• asce.org/kids - The American Society of Civil Engineering kids' pages
• civilengineeringdegree.org - Complete List of Accredited Engineering Degrees
  

• ldraw.org - LDraw™ is an open standard for LEGO CAD programs that allow the user to create virtual LEGO models and scenes. LDraw is and always will be offered free of charge.
• brickplayer.com - Private, independent website featuring LEGO sculptures, mosaics, news, reviews, and building tips & tricks.
• brickjournal.com - BrickJournal is a magazine that spotlights the many aspects of the LEGO Community. Events, people, and models are showcased in every issue, with a couple of surprises too! BrickJournal journalist Joe Meno is always found at the FLL World Festival.
• brickshelf.com - Cool LEGO building stuff.
• peeron.com - More cool LEGO stuff, including a list of parts numbers and names; color chart, sets, building instructions (often old item no longer available on www.LEGO.com)
• classic-castle.com - For LEGO castle aficionados
• bricklink.com - Premium venue for individuals and businesses from all around the world to buy and sell new, used and vintage LEGO® through fixed price and auction services
• brothers-brick.com - The Brothers Brick is a LEGO blog for adult fans of LEGO
• lugnet.com - International LEGO Users Group Network, a global community of LEGO enthusiasts. LUGNET unites LEGO fans worldwide through forums, web pages, and services.
•  The Art of LEGO Design by Fred Martin- A slightly outdated, but still very useful guide to building with LEGO. This document covers building robots that don't fall apart!
  

• NXT Programming Tutorial
  Downloadable, excellent introductory and advanced programming tutorials for NXT. Provides step-by-step guidance and explanations of the skills needed to create simple and more advanced NXT-G robot code. You may download and use the tutorials in a classroom or team setting, or distribute to the group to learn on their own.
  NXT Programming Tutorial (IN SPANISH)
• Programming Tips
  Quick programming tips for any FLL coach, with answers to some commonly asked questions.
• Team Practice Activity (Mini-Challenges)
  Helping the team gain the programming skills they will need is a hard job for the coach. This document will guide you, the coach, through practice sessions with your FLL team. These exercises are designed to point the way to the skills the team will need to solve the Challenge. Your team can use these exercises before the season begins, or as you see a need during the season. You may choose sections to learn specific skills, or complete the entire training. Depending on the team’s learning curve, to complete all the exercises will take from five to ten hours.
  FIRST Place Scooter Instructions
  Instructions for the optional training robot to go with the above training activities.
• FIRST Place Scooter Light Sensor Addition Instructions
  Instructions for the light sensor addition to the above robot.
• FIRST Place Scooter Touch Sensor Addition Instructions
  Instructions for the touch sensor addition to the above robot.
• FIRST Place Scooter Rotation Sensor Addition Instructions
  Instructions for the rotation sensor addition to the above robot.
• ROBOLAB Starter Sheet - Specific to ROBOLAB 2.5.4
• NXTLOG, from LEGO.com
  Share and archive your LEGO® MINDSTORMS® NXT projects, and get inspired to build with NXT from the MINDSTORMS Community

• GEAR-Tech-21
  This free comprehensive curriculum includes six to nine activity modules introducing robot design, building and programming for the LEGO NXT to get your FIRST team started. For teams that want to expand their knowledge for the next year or explore additional topics, additional modules will keep your youth engaged in STEM year-round. Developed specifically for informal education programs by Nebraska 4-H, GEAR-Tech-21 is adaptable for camp, club, team, afterschool program and in-school program use. All activities are referenced to national science, technology, mathematics and life skills standards.
  
• Carnegie Mellon Curriculum
  The most comprehensive FIRST LEGO League robotics and engineering curriculum we have seen. From the Robotics Academy of The National Robotics Engineering Center and Carnegie Mellon, there are two items available here. First, a free robotics curriculum,a project involving many teachers, university faculty, engineers, and others. The outline covers almost everything you could want, but as it is an incomplete version a few documents are missing here and there. Available in English or Spanish, this school robotics curriculum is in depth coverage of the concepts involved in building and programming a robot. Next, based on this original material, a completed curriculum is available for purchase on CD. Also from Carnegie Mellon - Introductory training materials for LEGO MINDSTORMS robot and TETRIX
  
• The Art of LEGO Design by Fred Martin
  A slightly outdated, but still very useful guide to building with LEGO. Most importantly for new teams, this document covers building robots that don't fall apart.
• NASA Educational Robotics Matrix
  This is a list of robotics and engineering educational materials, collected by NASA. Not all of the materials here apply to FIRST LEGO League.
• Tufts Center for Engineering Educational Outreach Curriculum
  This site is an encyclopedia of LEGO part names and uses, building and programming hints, and physics concepts. Also, about 40 classroom activities and curriculum ideas using LEGO elements and ROBOLAB to help teach subjects, from science and engineering to reading and art, are available for download. Another database of activities is below under LEGO Invent & Investigate Database.
• Trifolioum Gears Lesson
  A lesson plan about gear types and uses using LEGO gears to illustrate. Introduction to gears lesson.
• How Stuff Works
  This is a great site for explanations of how things work. It is not a curricula, and not specific to FIRST LEGO League, but has very good explanations of general engineering concepts. For example, How Gears Work, How Gear Ratios Work, and How Differentials Work.

Listing of National Educational Standards met by City Sights!
A listing of National Educational Standards met by the 2002 Challenge City Sights! This list was prepared for FIRST LEGO LEAGUE by the Wisconsin Creative Problem Solving Programs at the University of Wisconsin.