Kids First Coding & Robotics | No App Needed | Grades K-2 | Intro To Sequences, Loops, Functions, Conditions, Events, Algorithms, Variables | Parents’ Choice Gold Award Winner | by Thames & Kosmos

First of all, I took a bit of a leap on this one because we had mixed results with another kit from the same company (the candy claw machine). It was VERY complex and it ended up my wife and I had to do the bulk of the construction. I worried this would be similarly challenging, bit it is PERFECT for younger kids (I'd say < 8 but even a 10 year old would probably have a blast). And once the physical construction is done that's where the real fun begins. The kit comes with two different types of cards that fit together like jigsaw pieces: programming cards and map cards. You use the former to "program" the bot and the latter to let it "execute" that program from its memory. It's worth mentioning I've had a number of false starts getting my kids (7 and 5) into the basics of coding. Typically the teaching tools I've found are either non-intuitive to a kid, or if they are the principles they impart are often non-transferable. If the lessons gleaned are entirely internal to the game or tool, what good is that? Within 20 minutes of beginning to lay out their programs, my kids were immediately learning highly transferable lessons about syntax, object orientation, debugging, trimming sequences to make them shorter without sacrificing functionality, etc. And all without the need for a complicated tablet app or any such thing. Everything you need comes with the kit. The construction feels hardy enough to withstand even the most brutish kids and the whole thing has the feel of a toy to them. Both of my kids are on Scratch almost every day (haven't quite made the leap to Python with my oldest), but I dare say this kit more efficiently taught them the most foundational and transferable principles of coding of any tool I've seen yet. Don't be scared of the price tag. Many dozens of lessons and experiments will keep the insights running for quite a while. This thing is worth every penny! My sense is if your kid is in Grade 4+, you can probably just skip straight to a real language. There will be struggles, but they may as well learn a real language at that point. The insights about syntax and debugging and such will just come from experience. But for younger kids this is the best tool I've ever seen for teaching the foundations of coding, bar none.

Great Christmas gift for a kid!

Great package! Keeps my 5 year old busy for hours putting the parts together and coding the route. It’s fun cuz it makes sound and can make one robot interact with another. Comes with clear instructions for both adult and kids to put everything together. Slight downside is the number of parts that comes with it. Require time to put together before it runs for the first time. Moving on to the next chapter require tearing down of the previous robots u created. My 5yo didn’t want to tear it down cuz she spent so much time making it.

My son (5) loves this! With a little bit of guidance this is at the perfect level for following instructions, learning sequencing/patterns and concepts essential for coding. It also is fantastic because he's so excited to play it because Sammy and the things he does is so much fun. This is a legitimate robot, it has a sensor that runs autonomously based on the code your child writes. And because your child writes the code, Sammy has endless possibilities to the combinations of things he can do. As for the reviews about too many pieces to deal with, I found a simple organizing box (pictured which was actually M&D box from a car set) helps organize all the pieces perfectly. The cards have a little holder which keeps them all organized. I can't complain with the number of pieces, it makes it super flexible and a great value.

Fun and easy to use, very educational!

I hardly ever leave a review. This product made me leave one, though. We bought this product 2 years ago. At that time, my kid was 7 years old. He tried constructing the plastic pieces, code and map cards. Even with my help, he could not understand the 'code' card concepts. I let the toy sit for a year. Now during this summer (2022) holidays, I helped him kickstart the first project. He immediately latched on to it, built all the projects in the manual. He finished all the projects in under a month. He loved the coding concepts like - If condition, loops, sub-routines etc. This is an amazing toy for a kid approximately 8 yrs. old, may be even younger. One con with the product is that the 'code cards' (Item no 53) do *not* fit into the 'code card frames' (Item no 54) properly. As a result, code cards falls through the frames. Sometimes the 'Robotic base unit' (Item no 44) fails to scan the code cards. Other than the minor flaw, this is an amazing product.

My little one loves this so much. It’s so simple and easy to figure out and there’s so many different combinations of courses to make for the robot and different forms the robot can take. The actual coding part is so simple (shown in the video) and it’s super easy for kids so they can be introduced to coding. Heck my husband and I played with it for a bit too! 10/10 so fun!

hard to use at first It is a little awkward but not unusable.

One must be very careful with the carton pieces as these are subject to damages. Not fully understand how much damage could thes carton take before it will not work properly anylonger. Good luck!

Fun and enjoy, but the quality of those card board puzzle and coding card can further improve

My son loved this!

I completely LOVED it! Bought it as a gift for my nephews and they are thrilled with it . I recommend it at 100%.

Beautifully boxed and packaged. Well made, educational toy. A little pricey, but there's a lot gone into designing and making. If I had anything negative to say at all it would be that the instructions are really for adults, far to complicated for a child to understand.