For students at Tarver Elementary School in Thornton, playing with Legos is serious business.

The students make up two Lego robotics teams, the Techno Tigers and the Tiger Bots, and are headed to the First Lego League state competition on Feb. 2 at the Colorado School of Mines in Golden.

First Lego League is a robotics program for 9 to 14-year-old designed to get children excited about science and technology. The teams are judged in four categories — robot games, team work, presentation and team spirit. This is the first time the Tarver students have qualified for state.

“Our students are in fourth- and fifth-grade, so to make it to state being on the younger end is really exciting. It’s a fantastic program,” said teacher and coach Wendy Brewick.

This year’s robotic theme is senior solutions. The two teams have to come up with ideas on how to create a better life for seniors ages 65 and older. For the robot portion of the competition, the students build Lego robots and then program them through the computer. The robots are placed on a field mat to complete missions that illustrate different ways a senior’s life can be enhanced. Brewick said the teams have two-and-a-half minutes to accomplish as many missions as possible. She said the robot game is just a portion of the competition, the students also have to give a five-minute presentation on a senior solutions idea, all while being judged on their teamwork and team spirit.

“We have a lot of high achieving students in the groups. So when they come together as a team, they really have to learn how to work together with other kids who actually have ideas and want to work,” she said. “It was a little bit of a struggle at the beginning of the year, but they have really come together and learned how to work as a team and share ideas.”

Avery Ketelsen decided to join the team because some of his friends were on it. But soon, he said he realized the robotics team was a lot of fun, and making it to state was an added bonus.

“It’s really fun and my favorite part is programming because you get upset if doesn’t work, but then you fix and then it works,” he said. “And when we won, we were all so excited because we were waiting for our name to be called. And then the other team was called and they were all excited, too.”

Both teams are focusing on improving on all aspects of the competition. Parent coach Joe Comeaux said he’s been most impressed with how far the students have grown as a team and all the tremendous amount of work they have put in over the past few months.