LEGO Education–Simple Machines Kit

Hi everyone! I don’t know about your kiddos, but mine can barely wait until summer break…

Then about five minutes into our first day of break…

They’re bored.

 

Of course we do all of the normal fun summer stuff like trips to the swimming pool, bike rides, park days, and picnics. But what about those days when you just don’t feel like going anywhere?

I have the perfect solution, and best of all it’s educational!

You know.

Because I’m a homeschooler.

And I like stuff that’s educational.

Especially when it’s like “sneaky educational”, where they are learning and don’t even realize it because they’re having so much fun!

I stumbled onto the LEGO Education website a few months back and I’m so excited I could just scream.

Don’t worry. I won’t.

But seriously, these kits are so incredibly cool! I mean seriously fun, I even joined in on the fun when we received the Simple and Motorized Mechanisms Base Set for review.

Disclosure: I am a blogger for LEGO Education and received this product free for review on my website. The opinions expressed in this post are my own and were not influenced by the free product provided. We absolutely LOVE LEGO Education and can’t say enough about how cool this program is!

 

The Simple and Motorized Mechanisms Base Set comes in a handy storage box like the one shown above, and inside there are two compartments for pieces.The LEGOs all come in bags like normal, unfortunately they aren’t organized together by compartment which would have been a LOT easier for us to sort.

But it’s okay, we managed to get them all separated after a bit. And they do provide you with a picture that shows where all of the pieces should go to make them easier to find during the building process. It also helps when putting pieces away later.

 

When you lift out the top tray, you’ll find another tray for larger items such as motors, wheels, and wind materials.

 

The kit also comes with several books on to help your student build. It contains 396 LEGO Technic elements and full building instructions for 10 principle models and 18 main models. The books are labeled as “Book A” and “Book B”. At first I wasn’t sure why this was, however after talking with the LEGO Education specialists, they told me it was so two students can build together. Each one builds a certain portion of the creation on their own, then they come together and work as a team to put their pieces together to form the final creation.

It’s a great way to work on not only individual logical thinking skills, but also helps students learn to work as a team!

 

We’re actually going to use this kit with a co-op group. We’ve previously done a LEGO Club where all of the kiddos created a themed project, then came together and did a small presentation on their project. Instead of continuing with that, we’re going to get together and go through the LEGO Education Simple and Motorized Mechanisms set.

You can use the kit alone, or purchase the Simple & Motorized Mechanisms Activity Pack separately which has all of the lesson plans written out for you. It’s literally a whole curriculum if you’d like to make this program into a more formal unit which we will do for next year. Here is how LEGO Education describes this kit:

“Using the activity pack, students will investigate the principles of simple machines, mechanisms, and structures; experiment with balanced and unbalanced forces and friction; measure distance, time, speed, and weight; and much more. The activity pack comes in a three-ring binder and provides 30 lessons featuring 37 principle model activities; 14 main activities, each with extension activities; and six problem-solving activities. Also included is a CD-ROM with teacher’s notes, student worksheets, and glossary.”

 

 

Of course Turbo was ALL OVER this kit when it got here, so there was no way I could ask him to wait until next year’s co-op! And actually since we’ve received it I’ve found him creating all kinds of cool things using the kit. I think the best part are the addition of motorized elements that make it so cool.

After going through a few of their lessons, I found him creating his own machine which was really cool. He definitely had to use some skills to figure out how to create space for the gears and motor, while allowing room for tires so the thing would actually move.

 

Here is a video we made of a few of Turbo’s creations using this kit: LEGO Education Video: Simple &  Motorized Machines Base Set.

 

Here is an up close of one of the crane’s Turbo made. I don’t know if you can tell but it’s rescuing a LEGO guy from eminent danger.

 

And here is his Dog. As you probably saw in the video, it moves it’s mouth and tail.

 

They also sent us this fun calendar which Turbo normally updates for us.

 

Want more information on LEGO Education? Click any of the links below! They have products for all different grade and skill levels!

• LEGO Education Facebook
• LEGO Education Twitter
• LEGO Education on Pinterest
• LEGO Education on Instagram
• LEGO Education YouTube Channel
• LEGO Education Blog

 

Disclosure: I am a blogger for LEGO Education and received this product free for review on my website. The opinions expressed in this post are my own and were not influenced by the free product provided. We absolutely LOVE LEGO Education and can’t say enough about how cool this program is!

 

This post is part of my Summer Boredom Buster Series, click below to see more ideas!

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