This year has proven to be a challenging one for anyone planning events! Like many others, we had to adjust our plans to suit multiple lockdowns and social distancing requirements to launch this exciting new Digital Technologies range: LEGO® Education.
Instead, we turned to a webinar format. While it's not quite as exciting as hands-on product trials, we were lucky to have Mark Lockett, a LEGO Education Acadamy Certified Trainer, on board.
Watch the video to get a taste of how LEGO Education sets could impact your students and help you teach coding, robotics and many other STEAM related subjects. Outline of the products below.
LEGO® Education: OfficeMax Webinar
LEGO Education provides a continuum of hands-on STEAM solutions with standards-aligned lessons that are adaptable to the needs of students across all ages and abilities.
Coding Express
For children ages 2-5 years
What is the purpose of Coding Express?
- Problem-solving
- Computational thinking
- Using digital tools to design and express ideas
Key Learning Concepts
- Sequencing
- Looping
- Conditional coding
- Expressing ideas with digital elements
- Language & literacy
- Collaboration
- Problem-solving
- Critical thinking
What's in the box?
- 234 LEGO DUPLO® elements
- DUPLO train with Push & Go engine
- 10 action tags in 5 different colours
- 6 double-sided building cards
- Classroom poster
- Introduction guide
- "Getting started" card with 5 short activities
For 6 students.
Free optional app
The app provides four themes for students to explore: Characters, Journeys, Music and Math. Plus, with the app you can alter the behaviour of the action tags.
The basics of coding
Coding Express is a fantastic visual representation of how a program can come together. As the train moves down the tracks it gets triggered by the action tags (lines of code) to do different things. For example, stop, sound a horn or flash its lights.
Plus, you're not limited to just teaching coding. Use characters and blocks to create stories, or count track pieces to teach basic counting, distance and addition.
WeDo 2.0
For children ages 8+ years
Key Learning Concepts
- Life Science
- Earth and Space Science
- Physical Science
- Engineering
What's in the box?
- 1 WeDo 2.0 Hub
- 1 Motor
- 1 Distance Sensor
- 1 Tilt Sensor
- 280 bricks
Free app
This app comes with:
- Building instructions
- Getting started
- Guided Projects
- Open Projects
- Guided Projects - Computational Thinking
- Open Projects - Computational Thinking
Your hub connects effortlessly to the app via BlueTooth. Once it's connected, students can build their code with an easy "drag-and-drop" system. Rather than "coding" by laying physical coloured tiles on a track (like in Coding Express) students are now coding with a device, using pre-set instruction blocks to tell their robot what to do. The app is easy to explore and experiment with, and comes with built in activities for learning. Plus, the box lid serves as a great building base.
SPIKE™ Prime
For children ages 10+ years
Key Learning Concepts
- Dual coding languages: Python and drag-drop blocks
- Problem Solving with authentic contexts
- Critical Thinking
- Construction & Engineering
- Iteration
- Protoyping and Systematic Testing
What's in the box?
- 1 Spike Hub
- 2 Medium Motors
- 1 Large Motor
- 1 Force Sensor
- 1 Light Sensor
- 1 Distance Sensor
- 582 bricks: The SPIKE Prime kit begins introducing Technic pieces - such as pins - to help students quickly build more intricate robots.
For 2 students
Free app
As with WeDo 2.0, the app is easy to pick up and explore. It comes with units such as "Invention Squad" and "Kickstart a Business" which all have their own activity sets within them. Every brick you need for the activities will be in the base set.
In this app students can choose between two styles of coding. The first is similar to the WeDo 2.0, with a drag and drop function. Once students have become comfortable with this, they can move on to a text-based coding system, Python.
LEGO, the LEGO logo, DUPLO and SPIKE are trademarks of the LEGO Group. Used with permission. ©2020 The LEGO Group