Four Maryknoll School fifth-graders clinched the Amaze Award at the 2016 VEX Worlds, an international robotics competition held last month in Kentucky.

The annual award is a judges’ pick that goes to a team that has built a high-scoring robot that demonstrates overall quality — solid mechanical design and construction that’s tough enough to complete the competition’s designated tasks. Plus, Amaze Award recipients must be able to explain how the team worked together to develop their robot.

Among 147 teams assembled for the competition, Maryknoll’s competitors — Christopher Casupang, 11, Chris Ho, 10, Ethan Kimura, 11, and Jayden Asato, 11 — were unique in that their team had no captain. Each team member had a hand in prep and presentation.

Their coach, Lee Kimura, said, “I heard … that the judges enjoyed interviewing them.” He added, “They articulated their understanding of the components of their robot.”

Not bad for a team that placed second to last in their first competition two years ago.

When the boys were in third grade, Kimura, who is Ethan’s dad, approached school officials with the idea of starting a robotics club for students.

“The main thing was to learn some STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) information and have fun together,” he said. While the boys all played sports, robotics surfaced as “another area to learn teamwork and sportsmanship.”

For the VEX Worlds elementary school division, top teams representing states and countries built robots capable of grasping a plastic ball and putting it in a goal.

Chris Ho said he and his teammates, who also play baseball, put together a robotics strategy inspired by the mechanics of a pitching machine.

“You drive it (the robot) against a wall,” Chris said. Then, a “scoop gets the ball, lifts it into the conveyor belt. It shoots it into the flywheel, and the flywheel shoots it into the goal.”

Ethan Kimura said the boys designed the scoop after a walnut picker his dad and team members saw in a video posted online. The coach said, “It was an accidental discovery. … They said, ‘Oh, look! It picks up the ball.’”

The boys repurposed a conveyor belt they had used for a third-grade robotics project for this year’s VEX challenge.

Other Hawaii teams selected to take part in the international competition included the Mililani Masters, with team members from various schools; Pukalani Elementary’s STEM- imagineers; Sacred Hearts Academy’s Lancer Robotics; Island Pacific Academy; and Keaau Elementary School’s LunaTechs. The Mililani Masters won the competition’s Sportsmanship Award.

During the four-day event in Louisville, Maryknoll team members — with the exception of Ethan — contended with some nervous butterflies while awaiting announcement of winning teams. Jayden said Ethan seemed unfazed. “He started doing the Harlem Shake,” Jayden said.

The boys said they also had fun attempting to communicate with Egyptian, Chinese, Korean and Puerto Rican robotics teams.

The Maryknoll team’s success and enthusiasm are now prompting the Honolulu private school’s administrators to fold robotics into next year’s curriculum as an elective class.

Maryknoll Grade School Principal Shana Tong, a former science teacher, said robotics-style hands-on learning is important in developing critical thinking and problem-solving skills. In addition, she said, the team’s sense of sportsmanship at its competitions is inspiring.

“They would cheer even when they weren’t at the top of the heap,” Tong said.

Michelle Nakamura, a third-grade teacher who has helped coach the Maryknoll team, said the the club “helps them with their confidence skills … and teamwork … so they can bring that back to the classroom.”