Project Title

Category B (non-competitive)

New Mexico High School
Supercomputing Challenge
Final Report
April 4, 2001

Team Number 035

Shiprock High School

Team Members: _Shirleen Washburn__ _Christopher Jim_____ ___________________ ___________________ Sponsoring Teacher: _V. Noble__________ _H. Hines__________ Project Advisor: __________________

Team Number:	035
School Name:	Shiprock High School
Area of Science:	Psychology
Project Title:	Spiraling, Swirling, Spinning Around A Sphere
Project Abstract:	http://www.challenge.nm.org/Abstacts/035.shtml
Interim Report:	http://www.challenge.nm.org/Interim/035.shtml
Final Report:	http://www.challenge.nm.org/Finals/035.html

We are team 035 from Shiprock High School, team members Shirleen Washburn and Christopher Jim. Our area of Science is Psychology and the project title is Spiraling, Swirling, Spinning Around a Sphere.

We have created a new perspective pertaining to Behavioral Sciences. We have attempted to construct a program using Starlogo, being unsuccessful in making this close to possible. However, we have rethought the procedure we are taking and foresee a much greater chance of achieving this next year.

Our objective is to create a "turtle" family using the Starlogo program in a local environment and have it perform basic human survival functions. We would then analyze the "turtles" performance and incorporate simple human actions into them. When using the Starlogo program, we had to input the "turtles" codes to bring them to life so they can survive daily basic tasks. Once we have entered the codes in the turtle procedure window, the observer command center is where you have control of what goes on in the program. The turtles would then go to the patches and collect food for survival.

Earlier in the year we discovered that the Starlogo program used less resources than a regular family would use in a single day. We learned that this project was somewhat complicated at the beginning due to the large selection of codes in the Starlogo program. We found that working with Starlogo is not easy, because it would take months to figure out which codes would do the job for making what we had in mind and putting the right amount of turtles or numbers in the code area of the turtle command center and the observer procedure window to make the turtle go left or right in the scenario. Though ideas were formed, no real results were acquired from this project.

In the program we wanted to make two medium patches of crops and a water resource where the head turtle "father" and offsprings would get food and water to bring back to the home. They would then rest for two seconds and go out again and get more food for survival.

We would like to thank our teachers Mrs. Noble and Mrs. Hines for helping and guiding us throughout this project. Without David Olivas encouragement and inspiration we would have not seen where our project could go. To the consult team of David Kratzer, Eric Ovaska, Celia Einhorn, and Betsy Frederick, thanks for all your help.