Engineering

Cubelets and STEM education just kind of go together. Already awesome at exposing super young students to engineering and programming, the addition of the Cubelets Classroom Packs have added a renewed focus on collaboration! All their kits allow educators to combine coding and engineering in the classroom.

The GoPiGo build-your-own robotics kits are top of the line. They are powered by a Raspberry Pi and come in wide ranges of sizes to fit all needs and accommodate various classroom setups. The Base Kit is the smallest and perfect for any students who have used a Raspberry Pi, whereas the Starter Kit is for those who want to

The Curious Cars kit in particular comes with six pieces of technology, all very uniform in size, and all encased in soft, malleable plastic. They are clearly labeled in simple language, and the whole kit is very fun to touch, which is designed to be encouraging for learners and get them started with getting their hands on the technology.

The EdCreate Kit is something all STEM teachers should be looking to add to their classrooms. It’s pretty much guaranteed to inflate students’ skills as they expand on Edison’s build with 115 interlocking parts they can use to create five exciting, new robots. The EdTank, EdDigger, EdRoboClaw, EdCrane, and EdPrinter.

The Meccano Meccanoid G15KS is a personal robot kids can build from the ground up. With three ways to program, voice recognition, and smart device communication, the Meccanoid might just become their best robot friend ever! Once built, it towers at almost four feet tall (122 cm) and it comes with 1,014 parts, two hand tools, a battery, and more.

E-Blox, as their name implies, are electronic building blocks—almost exactly like LEGOs—except they’re conductive! Kids can enhance their design and engineering skills and also get more familiar with electronics at the same time. And, with over 10 specialized kits available on our store, there’s always a new area of STEM for them to master.

Today, I experimented with the Snap Circuits Arcade Kit, a kit that allows students to build over 200 exciting projects and includes 20-plus Build and Play games. With over 35 parts, including a programmable word fan, tri-colored orb, and a pre-programmed micro-controller, the Snap Circuits Arcade kit is perfect for projecting a light arcade show!

Makeblock’s mBot is one of the best educational robot kits for beginners on the market. Unlike most robots, students build this one from scratch, bolstering their engineering skills and getting into the inner workings and electronics involved with robotics. Designed for students in grades 1-7, the mBot is easy to assemble and a great entry-level robotics tool!

If you’ve ever explored our site (if you haven’t, now is a pretty good time), you’ve likely seen hundreds of different EdTech tools, including some for every single age group and ones that cover just about every STEM area imaginable. We’ve got a gift for each of the 15 days of techXmas and, hopefully, you can learn something, too.

The meeperBOT 2.0 is an affordable, programmable, and LEGO-compatible robot recommended for kids aged five and up that features a simple design but packs some great capabilities. Kids can drive, program, and video their bot using three different drive modes and various command functions in the meeperBOT app.