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Good Robot Projects For K-5?
bugs2squash writes "Some of the parents of kids at my son's elementary school would like to set up a robotics club for the children. I see that Lego has a new line of robotics bricks called wedo (PDF) and that seems to be the path of least resistance to doing something. But I wanted to ask: What experience do all y'all have of running a robotics club for this age group (5 thru 10 years old) and what factors made it a success (or failure)? Did you use a commercial kit of parts or brew something from scratch? What kind of projects work well with kids this age? I was thinking maybe making robot flowers (yes, I know they'd all rather build robotic sharks with lasers)." (Here's another page about Wedo.)
10 year old kids weren't even born when that movie was released.
Now, Transformers on the other hand has had a lot of influence.
"As God is my witness, I thought turkeys could fly." A. Carlson
I think that age group is too young to build robots on any informative level. I'm sorry, but they just won't "get it". Instead, why don't you buy some working robotic toys and let the kids program them to repeat an action, maybe, or just play with them? Maybe stage a battle with robotic dinosaurs or something? That would be way better for a five year old than actually building a working system.
Just because I can hook a shark from a boat, I do no offer to wrestle it in the water.
5 year olds and 10 year olds can be quite different. It would not be a good idea to treat all of these kids as the same.
with big, nasty, pointy teeth!
I remember being that age and working with motorized constructs.
They were great. Different belts on different size flywheels creating different speeds. Connecting a bar to a hinge and part of the fly wheel allows you to make simple robots with arms that go up and down.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
Having done some robotics(FIRST) in highschool, I'd be leery of trying to make it work with "real" parts. We had access to a university machine shop and something resembling an actual budget, and fabricating/buying/waiting for/modifying parts consumed an inordinate amount of time and effort. All of those things are useful learning experiences, particularly for people who want to go into engineering; but if you have limited time, money, or children's attention span, you'll burn more time on logistics then you will on learning.
Compared to any source of machine parts that doesn't involve very high levels of ingenuity and scrounging Lego is pretty cheap, and you can do pretty sophisticated stuff with it.
FIRST junior Lego league is designed for this age group, and though I haven't been involved at that age level, I know the middle school and high school programs are good, and the elementary school version looks age appropriate.
The FIRST organization is definitely an outstanding model of teaching kids what is is that programmers and engineers do in a way that is exciting and relevant to each age group. I highly recommend checking them out.
http://www.usfirst.org/firstlegoleague/community/jfll/welcome.html
Blessed are the pessimists, for they have made backups.
Before tackling something as complex as a "robots" how about basic things like teaching them about electricity and magnetism. Let them build electric motors, circuits that light up LEDs, and don't forget mechanical concepts like gears, pulleys and levers. Think fundamental physics-type experiments.
I don't know if they even make them any more, but I always had Robotix when I was a kid - they use a hex shaped connector and were a lot bigger and sturdier than Legos, but you could use them to build robots literally as tall as you were. The sets came with motors that connected to a battery pack and to a control panel that you could use from several feet away. I always had a lot of fun building things from the ground up using the raw materials and integrating the motors into the structures to give mobility to the construct, or to enable it to perform some kind of task. Like Legos, the sets come with guide books, but I always found that, even at that age, I could come up with new and better ways to build the thing they had pictured than the instructions gave. Link to the first site that demos it: http://www.roboticsandthings.com/
Whenever I think about kids and robots I can't help but think about Perp-a-tron. Not sure if a child molesting robot is a suitable project for the kids, but it'll put them ahead of the game.
Oh no... it's the future.
There is a First Lego League with particapation starting at 6 years old I think this might fit your bill. I've been hearing great things about it.
The URL is: http://www.usfirst.org/firstlegoleague/community/homepage.html
Good Luck
I first learned to program with Lego Logo for the Apple IIe when I was in 2nd grade, and the experience was priceless. I highly recommend a lego solution because it makes the hardware easy.
Some great examples of projects are robot cars that follow a line on the ground (use an optical sensor to trace it), item counting conveyor belt, ping-pong ball pitching machine, and block sorting machine (an evolution of the conveyor belt with counter, it diverts blocks to different bins based on length.
The new lego kits have GUI programming interfaces, but I was able to do everything in logo as a kid, so don't assume you have to dumb things down as much as you might expect.
When I was in that age range, schools were building eggmobiles (machines that can carry raw eggs over an obstacle course at high speed) and competing in the Granada Power Game (the contest I entered involved dropping a coin exactly half-way along a track, again at high speed).
Children not much older were competing quite successfully at contests such as the Micromouse tournament.
This is not to say that kids these days would be satisfied with such problems today, but this would seem a logical starting point as we know that it is possible for extremely young kids to really understand the mechanics and to really construct such devices with minimal outside help.
The question is, how to upgrade these sorts of problems to handle the expectations modern kids place on themselves, and the much more advanced technology required to keep them interested.
One possible starting point is to use K'Nex or Lego Mindstorms to produce a skeletal robot which the kids can then add to. The problem with this is that then the real logic part, the part they need to really solve, is the part that is solved for them.
Another option is to use the basic concept of the original problems, using the computer to provide steering rather than motive power. This keeps the mechanics simple enough for the kids, but allows for some very sophisticated logic behind the steering.
(For example, you could have a simple eggmobile that must avoid barriers with lights on top, using light-sensitive diodes and a simple programmable board for the control system.)
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
Then they can share funding with the sex ed classes.
"Common sense will be the death of us all"
... when you were a kid you had a lot of friends.
My favourite toys when I was age 5-10 were capsela, construx, and Jr. Radio kits. I only wish shows like Battlebots were around to further pique my interest.
Anything you can do to get your kid into higher-level thinking and problem solving (like elementary computer programming and robotics) will give them a huge leg-up in the education system. Any way you can make it fun for them will help them understand more.
I would suggest checking out PicoCricket. It is more geared towards artistic expression rather than building robots, but has light sensors, sound sensors, touch sensors, displays, etc.
Just give them a bunch of old CD-ROM drives, some AA batteries, and the MacGyver DVD box set.
You might want to look up botball. It will probably be more appropriate for your fifth graders. It gives them a good challenge, and most students were somewhat successful. We do robots that follow lines using a light sensor and sumo robots, but this is in the high school level, rather than K-5. You might try making the basic frame for the robot out of legos and letting them modify it rather than designing the entire robot.
You're either a very intolerant person or you're a hypocrite, which is it? Are you likewise offended by other forms of vernacular, such as 'sho nuff', 'oy veigh', 'n00b', etc? Either way, you're definitely a troll in my book.
Lighten up, Francis - using spelling and sentence structure to reflect the way a certain person speaks is an old, old literary technique. As for speaking like that, it's called a dialect, and if you believe you speak without using a dialect you are probably wrong.
"As God is my witness, I thought turkeys could fly." A. Carlson
Parallax makes a couple simple little kits for about that age range. They have wheels and can roll around with IR sensors, leds, and buttons. That would probably give them a good feel for how all the different elements connect and interact with each other.
Fischer Technik has by far the highest quality parts for constructing this kind of thing... but at a cost. They are not cheap. On the other hand, they are used by children to make models and by Universities to demonstrate & prototype industrial robots. It all depends on where you want to start and how much you want to spend.
Don't forget that Lego and your kid's creativity aren't the only winners here. According to the last, parenthetical link in the summary it's powered by LabView, which is something every technical person will see again and again in their lifetime.
Its modular, graphical interface is a perfect compliment for Lego-style robot building(and is also invaluable for test and measurement automation).
Add a laser to that shark and now you got me interested...
On the Oregon Cost born and raised, On the beach is where I spent most of my days
We (my 9 YO daughter and I) have NXT. I've see WeDo, it is probably more appropriate at the lower age ranges, since it is more limited. I know people that teach robotics using lego, although I haven't done it myself.
First, philosophically, you have to decide if you want to go the "competition" (ie FIRST, Botball, etc) route, or more of an "educational constructionist" route. Personally, I think competitions set up a host of perverse incentives that work against true learning. Far better to set up "challenges", and let each kid (or team) see how far they can get. The learning is in the trying, not the winning.
How much money do you have? Lego works well with teams of two. Can you afford one kit per two kids? Also you need to handle the logistics of how to store/secure half-built robots between sessions. And you will also need to get good at inventorying Lego. Exotic Lego parts have a way of disappearing... you might find yourself on BrickLink more than you want to be.
NXT-G is not easy for kids to use, despite anything Lego tells you. Expect to spend some time on that.
So, having said all those negative sounding things, I don't really know of a better alternative than NXT for your sitation.... and my daughter and I *do* have a heaping pile of non-Lego robots of various kinds.
I teach a Lego robotics class every Wednesday to 5th and 6th graders and an exceptional 2nd grader.
The Lego NXT educational kits are THE way to go if you are serious about this.
As a previous poster suggested... start them out with simple mechanical exercises using the kits before you give them motors and the brick... programing should be a reward for completing the fundamentals. The system also has good 3rd party support for extra types of sensors and other I/O solutions.
You will have a hard time finding another system that will combine the versatility of lego and the massive user base and tons of online suggestions for novel projects.
Save the FIRST robotics stuff for the really dedicated kids... ones who can secure a sponsor...($$$)
I'm working on something similar to this for my (undergrad) senior design project. My professor used a grant to make a bunch of custom-built robots using an ARM7 chip and some off-the-shelf parts, along with a simple C API for controlling the robots. He taught an intro CS course using these robots. Telling a robot to move around a room generally beats writing guess-the-number games in terms of student interest and interactivity.
Last year, a few student projects were started to make the process of simulating and debugging these robots easier for students. Our goal this year is to integrate them into Code::Blocks. One of the projects uses an icon-based UI similar in some respects to the Lego Mindstorms UI, and is targeted to elementary students; it generates C code that can run on the robots directly from icon diagrams that students create. We're updating that to allow importing preexisting C code into a diagram.
Ideally we'll be able to step through robot code, watch the robot move around on a , and track the program's execution in terms of the icon diagrams.
The LEGO smart path is really the way to go.
Global competitions, sponsors can be easy to get, And build robots out of LEGO pieces can be easy and versatile. Latter on in high school they move up into bigger bots. I have only coached 4-5th graders. Next year my daughter will do it for the 4th grade class and my son will be on the 6th grade class.
Assuming the both show the same enthusiasm.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
First Lego league. Smart is a completly different project I am working on.
My apologies.
http://www.usfirst.org/firstlegoleague/community/homepage.html
http://www.usfirst.org/
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
Most languages have a second person plural pronoun. For example, "tu" and "vosotros" in spanish. English lacks this, for no good reason, and this limits it's expressive power. Since we don't have a second person plural pronoun, we invented one. If you don't like it, tough.
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
This post is lame.
This is a really simple project, which can be found on Instructables, but one can also buy kits...
www.blinkybug.com
While it's a stretch to call them robots, they do interact in a way, and can help kids understand the basics of electricity and sensors. they antennae form a really simple spring switch, which triggers the blinking of their eyes (LEDs), and the body is a coin cell battery. I made some of these at a workshop at the Maker Faire a while ago.
I for one; have seen the movie Sandlot, and like other my age used tinker toys and legos to try and do the same kind of stuff. Kids in the ages of 5-10 should be able to make some sort of "object" that performs a "function." But it might not be a robot. Giving them specific goals will help, like build a machine that can throw a ball, kids that age like structure.
Yes we did, and it's 'you'. 'You all' I can handle, but unless I decide to take a trip to redneck America I don't want to hear 'y'all' ever again.
I'm not affiliated with these guys or anything, I've just used some of their stuff before. I build a real walking hexapod when i was in 9th grade, which is pretty far beyond 5th grade, but they may have something simpler, i dunno.
Actually, you may wanna look at the BOE bot, avaliable probably from parallax, but I'm not sure.
Anyway, i just love Lynxmotion. Might be for an older crowd, but they are good.
-Taylor
Worldwide Military budgets: $2100 billion. Worldwide Space Exploration budgets: $38 billion. Really, world? Really?
When my son was in 3rd grade, I bought the book: "Robot Building for Beginners", by David Cook. It was still too advanced for him to tackle alone, but we made a point of getting together for a couple hours each weekend and worked through the line-following robot project that the book describes. It took about two months to complete at that rate, but it was a blast and we both got alot out of it. He got to learn how to breadboard a circuit, cut/drill metal, control an electric motor, fry LEDs ;-), and assemble the final bot. And the circuitry itself was so simple that at the end he *really* understood how it worked.
I really recommend this approach, if you've got the time and patience to work with your kid on it.
It's good to have a variety of different robotics projects. Hopefully then you can interest all the kids, not just those who would traditionally be drawn to robotics. As a bonus, those who are already interested in robotics might develop an interest in botany as well.
These days robots have a wide variety of applications from industry to art and lots in between. I have actually seen robotic origami flowers in an art exhibition, they were pretty cool, I spent 30 minutes at that exhibit.
Maybe I'm a little biased, I consider myself well rounded in my nerdishness, but I always think cross-pollination is good (no pun intended).
Conservation of angular momentum makes the world go round.
Makezine ran an article last week on an interesting robot that looks appropriate for that age group.
In theory, practice and theory are the same. In practice, they're not.
In grad school I studied and developed methods to make programming accessible to young children. At the time, the general consensus in the field was that before the ages of 11-14, children don't typically have the cognitive ability to write programs, even simple ones. Even though I am a professional programmer now, when I was introduced to BASIC at age 9, I definitely didn't "get it." When I got to 7th grade I did.
Radia Perlman did some groundbreaking work in the 1970's to develop technology in the hope that 6-years-old could learn programming skills. Years later, Ken Kahn developed a game/programming environment called ToonTalk. From my personal experience and research, I don't think you can expect kids younger than 9 to build and program robots, but they can start playing with the physical and conceptual "building blocks."
I see from LEGO's literature that WeDo is aimed at children 7-11 years old. Their approach is very sensible: Keep things very, very simple: One motor, one motion sensor, and one tilt sensor. RoboSoccer can wait until they are older.
For further information
My brother and I went to a "class" thingy that used LEGO Dacta. Dacta was basically the precursor to Mindstorms, just less n00bified. You wrote the programs in actual code, not using LEGO's horrible GUI with blocks. Shortly after we completed the class two years in a row, LEGO released Mindstorms. I got it for Christmas that year and was very excited. That is, until I tried to program one of my bots. The stupidly-simple GUI for writing programs killed my interest in the whole thing.
My brother and I made some pretty awesome models including a conveyor belt that sorted based on color, a temperature controlled green house, and a black and white autofeed scanner. The scanner was epic. It was so cool to see the picture we drew show up on the computer screen.
After poking around, it looks like you can still buy the stuff: http://www.legoeducation.com/store/?global=usa
I feel obliged to mention my colleague's PhD thesis project from CMU, which he's now (I think) in the process of commercializing. It's called roblocks at the moment, and it's a modular robotic construction kit. Each block is an autonomous robot with onboard computation. Some blocks have sensors, others are actuators, and others can perform math. You can build different behaviors by connecting them together.
Roblocks are incredibly cool. Some may go so far as to say they are rad.
"You" is ambiguous. WHen you address a group of people as "you", each person has to decide whether the speaker meant "me" or "us". It's usually clear from context, but it's still awkward. "You all" is good, but "y'all" is easier to say. Do you also have a problem with "can't" and "they're"?
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
"I don't think you quite understand the mind of some young boys. "
Correction:
"I don't think you quite understand the mind of some young children. "
As a parent of a son and daughter, I see how that simple usage can make a young girl think girls don't do that sort of thing.
Young girls want an try to identify with being a girl, and as such avoid things labels for boys.(visa versa as well)
I encourage my daughter(and my son) in mathematics, science, engineering, chemistry(which she loves) etc and ahve seen her interest drop off as soon as some jack ass* adult says it's for 'boys'.
Clearly this doesn't involved grammar~
Fortunatly I talk with her often about it, and think she is starting to get it.
I don't want to seem a pedantic ass, but It si very personal. And yes, I will correct an adult I'm talking to if any kids are nearby.
*not that you are a jack ass, just that some of the people saying this are in a position of 'authority'.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
In one of my intro CS classes, we used a scribbler robot with a custom bluetooth dongle to allow easy programming in Python. I seem to recall the robots have a simple BASIC like language to begin with. See http://www.roboteducation.org/ [roboteducation.org].
Well there is always K-9 ... scratch that, that's probably for a time lord ;)
Jumpstart the tartan drive.
For the low end of that range, it is fun to PLAY robot. Explain the concept that robots only do exactly what you say, and then make some "commands" like "move forward", "turn left", "pick up object" and then work together to try to solve problems, like "how can we get the rubber snake into your sister's bed?". The kid plays the role of the programmer, the CPU, the robot motor (we use toy dump trucks typically for this), and the all-important role of the debugger.
http://www.legoeducation.com/store/default.aspx?CategoryID=159&by=9&c=1
Not cheap-- but far more than just wedo avaiable.
not even all lego products.. search for 'brutus'
every day http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Random
Hope this helps...
I'd recommend taking a look at FIRST robotics. FIRST stands for For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology, they are an organization created to get young people interested in engineering related fields for schooling. definitely worth taking a look into. http://www.usfirst.org/
How about an OregonTrailBot? A scripted user-agent that could break its leg and die of dysentery, thus learning about the dangers of expansionism so the kids don't have to.
THL phish sticks
Those kids would just love little robotic bunnies. So cute and they come in lots of colors...
http://www.therabbitvibrator.com/
The Math and Science Center in Richmond, VA has a robotics lab for K-5. You can find the lesson plans online at http://www.msinnovation.info/sch/lctr.htm
My wife taught these lessons and enjoyed them.
While I have no personal experience with the program, I know people who participate in, and have had great success with, FLL (FIRST Lego League) is an outstanding program. I currently am lead programmer at the high school level for a team, and I know it's a great program at that level. As for platforms, I mentor an elementary team which uses NXT, with Robolab as the programming environment. I've never had any problem with it, and it's relatively easy for the kids to pick up on. The Robolab environment (based on LabVIEW fwiw) is very good for teaching logic and then relating it to robot actions.
And neither are they. Just because you think you were a genious when you were 5 doesn't mean anyone else was. Didn't mean you were either.
I'd say start with the alphabet, shapes, colors, and counting, and then maybe you can move to reading, writing, and mathematics.
They're too fucking young for robotics.
My son and I built a robot together using David Cook's fantastic book "Robot Building for Beginners".
http://www.amazon.com/Robot-Building-Beginners-David-Cook/dp/1893115445/ref=pd_bxgy_b_img_b
He was four at the time. He helped with every aspect of the robot except the actual soldering. His favorite part was breadboarding the electronics since he got to put all the parts in by himself and see what happened with each new module added to the circuit. We spent a lot of time together shopping and scrounging for parts as well as building the robot. The reaction that he had when it was all built and working was priceless.
Sure he didn't learn anything about circuit analysis or programming but he does have an idea of what a resister does, what a transistor does etc. and he has an idea of what it takes to get a project done from start to finish. That's not bad for a four year old.
Now, his favorite thing to do is build things and he wants very much to be a scientist or engineer so I feel it was time, money and effort well spent.
I used to be part of Planète Science, a non-profit that teaches basic science to children of a lot of ages. I had a small workshop (~30 mins) where I explained the basis of robotics and programming to everyone interested including children younger than 10 years. What we had was one of the most simple robots possible : two sensors and one servo. It was in the shape of a cartoon sunflower. Its (smiling) head had two photo-resistor in place of eyes and the head could turn thanks to the servo. The obvious goal was to make it follow the light. We had a specially designed GUI to program the microchip embedded in the flowerpot.
:-)
I'm an engineer so I have very few experience with teaching. Hopefully, someone helped me see some basic facts:
- A servo is fun. Through our GUI we could simply change manually the position of the servo. Let children just do that. Let them put 50 and then 51 to see if they notice the movement, let them put 0 and 256 to check the maximum speed, they can play quite a bit with this.
- Then we had the inputs of the photoresistors. Let them hide it or light it so that they see how it varies.
- Don't show them what you are doing, let them do. I had a program that was almost complete except for the central part. I had a "if" with an empty expression and block and an empty "else" block. I explained what a test was and let them try several things. I guided them until they understood that the condition lefteye>righteye was interesting and that motor++ and motor-- was what they were looking for.
- Gloat about what they just did ! It is a robot ! And yes, explain that with sensors, with an actuator and with an algorithm, what they did completely qualifies as a robot. Far more than the RC "robotic" spider they saw just before and that had zero sensors
The Wise adapts himself to the world. The Fool adapts the world to himself. Therefore, all progress depends on the Fool.
It's one of the more advanced lego robotics kits but go for an NXT. You can teach some simple programming at the same time if you want with the NXT or there is a graphical programming client.
Check out www.nxtprograms.com/projects.html for some great ideas and the programs to get you going.
The institution i study (research) at hosts the Jounior First Robotics challenge. There are always anoying little kids shouting down the passage when one is trying to study a paper:);) ANyway to the point, take a look at their website: http://www.fllsa.org.za/community.htm I know some of the organisers they are friendly and (usually) helpful. You can contact them if you would like more information (see the "contact us" page). All the best.:D
"What experience do all y'all have of running a robotics club for this age group (5 thru 10 years old)... "
Actually, I think I work for one of these. ... looks like a pretty good fit, though.
I'm off-site so I'm just going by signs of intelligence, behaviour and achievement
Our club went pretty well when it was in full swing in the summer of 2005. We used Lego almost exclusively - with the RCX for more complicated tasks, or a SpyBotix and two Manas units for simpler RC robots.
The kids learned basic stuff like building strong structures, mechanical linkages, getting more than one action from a single motor, as well as teamwork and planning.
The format was to do a challenge, then give some theory that would enable them to do the same challenge better, and let them try it again. That way, the theory is relevant.
I also used some flat MDF, spray painted black, with Yellow Hazard taped borders to lay out arenas for RC bots - where the challenges were different - build something for speed, build one for control, build one that can get over the gap, build sumo bots. Black painted MDF with Yellow hazard borders looks like robot wars so they were really thrilled.
We did not participate in FLL, but I did try to get the kids to build a Great Ball Contraption - which was their largest group project.
OrionRobots now owns an NXT too, but is not currently running a club, perhaps I will again later, but for now I have my own kid on the way.
There isn't any windows at my house, can this kit work with Linux?
"The Most Fun Possible on 4 wheels" is at SunBuggy in Las Vegas
My company currently runs robotic programs for this age group. With kids K though 1 we have them explore a variety of robots that we get from OWI (www.robotkitsdirect.com). We have them experiment with various transportation systems such as tracks, legs, and wheels and various sensors such as the light sensor on the spider III and Hyper Line Tracker, as well as the microphone on the RockIt robot. We use a variety of remote control robots such as the Kabuto Mushi, Soccer Jr., and Air Zinger to talk about ROV (remotely operated vehicles) We also use their robotic arm kits with a laptop interface. We link all of these to real world examples with lots of laminated pictures. For kids grades 2 through 5 you do all of that and can have a lot of fun. We have been using the mindstorms systems from LEGO for about five years. With supervision they can build a simple roaming robot with bump sensors in about two hours or less. The programing interface provided with the retail kids, not the lab view version, is very simple and linear in design. It's drag and drop programing that the kids pick up very easily. 4th and 5th graders will venture into some of the more advanced features of the programs. For our summer camps we have the 2nd through 5th graders build an OWI kit robot such as the Air Zinger, RockIt Robot, Kabuto Mushi, Robotic Arm Trainer and the Robotic Arm Edge throughout the camp. At the end of the camp they get to keep the robot they built.
My daughter is in 2nd grade and my wife coached her team in Junior First Lego League this year. The rules specify that you have to include simple machines and moving parts (using motors and human power). The kids did all the work on their own and they totally get it. They got to show off their creation at LegoLand California. I highly recommend this program for K-5 students.
n/t
Never argue with a man carrying a water buffalo
While not specifically aimed at robots in education the people at SIGCSE would be an excellent resource for this sort of project and can likely give a research based opinion. Their website is http://www.sigcse.org/index.shtml
There is an article over at Dadmins.com about teaching young children programming and team work that may be of some help to you.
http://www.dadmins.com/2009/01/teaching-kids-the-basics-of-programming-using-physical-props/
Three weeks ago I finished coaching a team of 8 kids, 8 to 11 years old. We met for four consecutive months, once a week. From this experience I can tell you that 5 is way to young so as to participate in a robotics club. Our 8 year olds could pay attention for maybe 45 minutes, and that was it. I think a 5 year old would become disruptive after maybe 10 minutes. It is a nice idea, but impractical. We used the NXT Lego kit.
I've been running a Robotics Club in my local elementary school for 2.5 years now. We have a Mindstorms NXT set and the club is always very popular. One thing that helps is having interested parents. Several of them wish they had such a club as a kid so enjoy helping! One of them brings an NXT set from home so we have two to use. I show videos of robot-related things (funny commercials, industrial robots, trade show robots, Robo Wars). I also manage a junior high team for FLL and challenge the K-6 kids with similar challenges. Some of them love to build, some design, some program, and of course I encourage them to take turns. I have about 1/3rd girls, the rest boys. It's a lot of fun!
Feel free to contact me for more details.
http://www.ariankulp.com/
Here's a recent thread on the Usenet newsgroup comp.robotics.misc - the poster asks about how to do a high school club, but (especially with other posts here about how smart kids are) many responses should apply to your situation:
http://groups.google.com/group/comp.robotics.misc/browse_thread/thread/775ceae020f351a6#
I hadn't heard of the TI calculator interface before, and I've been to the monthly Atlanta meeting for years. Lately we've been wowed by one member's 3PI line follower (video on the site below).
And while the following isn't what you asked, it will make a good complement, and you're bound to find others there from your area with school-related activities similar to yours who can help. There may already be a general hobby robot club in your city that welcomes "children of all ages." Google for these:
robot clob
hobby robot
with the name of the nearest major city.
There's certainly a club in Atlanta:
http://botlanta.org/
Be sure to check out the Links page, at the bottom are links to other robot clubs in the USA (there may be other clubs not listed).
Tag lost or not installed.
I am part of a non-profit organization based in Seattle, WA that partners with local public schools to bring technology into classrooms. We have primarily worked with elementary and middle schools and the LEGO Mindstorms NXT kits. I would highly recommend the NXT robotics kits. They are very flexible tools which can be used for a very wide range of ages. We have had success using them with 1st grade through 8th grade - the kids love them! I also know of other programs using them at the high school as well as college level. On the other hand, the Wedo kits are appropriate only for the younger ages, and have a much more limited set of possible activities. For curriculum and activity ideas, take a look at our website: http://technicallylearning.org/ And our partner organization at Tufts University: http://legoengineering.com/