The Cubetto Robot is a small, wooden robot that educators can use to teach students coding skills without a device and at a very young age! All it takes is placing it on one of its cloth maps, having kids listen to a story, and sending the Cubetto on a journey. The Cubetto is specifically for children in Pre-K and kindergarten. It helps them learn about the basics of authentic coding through hands-on play. It truly is a viable solution for students at this young of an age thanks to its unmatched simplicity. It’s made largely of wood and includes a set of coding blocks in various colors. The different colored blocks all have unique and individual functions when it comes to controlling the robot. Each of those specific functions tell the Cubetto how to move depending on how they're sequenced in the board.
This method of physically handling the blocks is very important in teaching patterns, sequencing, and problem solving, which has proven to be effective even at such an early age. The included maps and educational storybooks also help educators expand playtime by empowering kids to guide their Cubetto. They can send it on themed adventures while adding elements of critical thinking and problem solving. Since it's also very friendly looking, the Cubetto is both a toy robot and an educational tool. For educational value, however, it definitely does promote creativity and exploration in early education. Children can use the Cubetto at as young as three years old. Benefits include recognizing patterns, exploring cause-and-effect relationships, and doing all that without the need for a screen.
In the standard Cubetto Playset, there is one robot, a control board, a world map, a story book, and 16 blocks. Additional maps are also available, including the Big City, Blue Ocean, Deep Space, and Ancient Egypt maps, which you can find on our store as well. Additional logic and direction blocks are there, too. The Logic Blocks negate and randomize actions, adding another level of complexity as kids begin to learn valuable skills through play. Thanks to this added element, educators can challenge students with more advanced problem solving. They're available as a separate add-on and help make learning with the Cubetto more precise for students.
To get started with Cubetto coding, teachers can put six AA batteries in both the robot and the board. Next, spread out the map on the floor and take a second to enjoy how big and soft it is—perfect for Pre-K and kindergarten classrooms! The robot, blocks, and board are super user-friendly and durable, clearly constructed with young children in mind. And, the storybook is also helpful in guiding kids through an adventure with the robot on the map.
We've used the 16 Cubetto coding blocks from the kit many times over the years. It's super easy to get the Cubetto to move forward and backward and have it turn left and right. Then, the blue function block adds another element to learning with the Cubetto, allowing students to repeat functions on their board! We should also mention that, once students have a program built on their board, they can press the blue button that's on the board to start running it.
In the classroom, the Cubetto helps teachers substantially enhance engagement and learning outcomes despite the ages of their students. Not only can students use the Cubetto to learn coding skills individually, it's also great for building collaboration. Since they can start as early as three years old, they don't need reading skills to use the Cubetto. This helps make it more inclusive and, ultimately, can lead to students developing key tech and motor skills more effectively.
Educators also have access to a teacher's guide and activity templates. You can find these resources on the Cubetto website. With the teacher's guide, they can quickly learn how to use the robot and the board so they don't waste any time when rolling it out with students. As for the activities, there are a bunch teachers can use with preschool, Pre-K, or kindergarten students in the classroom, library, or makerspace. In fact, students in over 20,000 schools around the world have used the Cubetto—a truly incredible number! In the process, it's provided kids with meaningful STEAM and exploration-based learning starting at a very young age.
Besides adding batteries, the Cubetto is ready right out of the box, making set-up very minimal. The fact that the Cubetto is screen-free allows students to engage instantly with hands-on learning and exploration that's designed for all genders. Learning with the Cubetto is also cross-curricular since educators can teach literacy, mathematics, and science all in one. Ideally, kids should collaborate when learning with the Cubetto. Depending on space, two kids per robot is the optimal option. The blocks even represent a tactile coding language so children can learn as they explore and play.
Like we said, the Cubetto Playset typically includes 16 coding blocks in the package. There are a total of seven types of Cubetto blocks, however, available to educators. Each block's color represents its function and there are also seven total block colors. The green block gets the robot to move forward and the purple block gets it to move backward. The yellow block leads to the robot moving left and the red one gets it to move right. The blue block is the function block, the six-sided tan block is the negation block, and the black block with six rounded sides is the random block.
As for Cubetto lesson plans, they can be as simple as students exploring or encouraging them to complete actual puzzles. It's a very open ended coding tool, however, and serves a very valuable purpose even in preschool. Students can use the robots in solving basic math problems, programming it to travel to certain images of animals, or any number of age-appropriate experiences. It's also effective for students with learning differences since it's very accessible due to its tactile element and friendly appearance. It can help them build both motor skills and intellectual skills as they use it.
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