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Lego Education's Newest Spike Prime Programmable Robots Aim For the Classroom (cnet.com)
Lego Education, the education-focused arm of the veteran Denmark company, is making its biggest product debut in three years, unveiling Spike Prime, a new kit that aims to mix the company's familiar bricks with motors, sensors and introductory coding lessons. The company is targeting kids aged between 11 to 14. From a report: Lego Mindstorms have been around for years. The Mindstorms EV3 robotics kit remains a staple of many learning centers and robotics classrooms. Lego's newest kit looks more like Lego Boost, a programmable kit that aimed to win over families in 2017 and was compatible with regular Lego bricks. It's compatible with Lego Boost, Lego Technic sets and classic Lego pieces, but not with Lego's previous Mindstorms accessories. Lego Mindstorms EV3 is remaining alongside Lego Spike Prime in Lego Education's lineup, and looks like it's aiming more at the high school crowd, while Lego Spike Prime could bridge to that higher-end projects.
The Spike Prime set is created specifically for grades six to eight. It uses an app that uses visual Scratch programming and aims to adopt the Python programming language by the end of the year, according to Lego Education executives. The robots made by Spike Prime look cute, and Lego Boost-like, but not necessarily as complicated as some Mindstorm kits. The central processing hub that drives the Lego Spike Prime robotics creations has six input and output ports, and connects with sensors including an RGB color and light sensor, a force-sensitive touch sensor, and an ultrasonic distance sensor for measurement and navigation.
The Spike Prime set is created specifically for grades six to eight. It uses an app that uses visual Scratch programming and aims to adopt the Python programming language by the end of the year, according to Lego Education executives. The robots made by Spike Prime look cute, and Lego Boost-like, but not necessarily as complicated as some Mindstorm kits. The central processing hub that drives the Lego Spike Prime robotics creations has six input and output ports, and connects with sensors including an RGB color and light sensor, a force-sensitive touch sensor, and an ultrasonic distance sensor for measurement and navigation.
I guess some people like Lego because it's an easy way to build simple things. You can snap something together in a couple hours. They plan to add Python to the Lego set, because Python is also easy, suitable for kids.
People like to snap something together in a couple hours with Lego. Same reason they like Python and PHP.
Oddly, nobody makes the mistake of thinking Lego, being easy, are a good way to build mission critical systems that your company relies on.
Then they seem to think that it's impossible to prevent production systems crashing, occasional data corruption, etc. Yeah it's pretty tough to prevent problems if you build enterprise applications using the same tools and techniques that children use in their play.
I might get this new Lego set for my daughter. She really enjoys Lego and is good at it - building things well beyond what most people would call "age appropriate". Might should wait a year, though. She breezes through second grade (age 7) schoolwork - and she's four.
Yes, I realize she's probably smarter than me.