Kids, Robots and Computers

Hi all,

My son is in the fourth grade and his science class just finished a unit
on robots. Now I think I have a future NASA scientist on my hands. He
keeps showing me drawings of robots he wants to invent to help him with
his chores. Any ideas to encourage his interest without spending too
much money on a gimmicky children's toy that will break in three months
anyways?

Maggie

Maggie wrote:
Hi all,

My son is in the fourth grade and his science class just finished a unit
on robots. Now I think I have a future NASA scientist on my hands. He
keeps showing me drawings of robots he wants to invent to help him with
his chores. Any ideas to encourage his interest without spending too
much money on a gimmicky children's toy that will break in three months
anyways?

Does his school or one of he local schools have
a robotics club? That's probably the best opportunity.
There seem to be a bunch around here.

Best wishes,
Ericka

On Sun, 31 Dec 2006 17:33:57 GMT, Maggie
wrote:

Hi all,

My son is in the fourth grade and his science class just finished a unit
on robots. Now I think I have a future NASA scientist on my hands. He
keeps showing me drawings of robots he wants to invent to help him with
his chores. Any ideas to encourage his interest without spending too
much money on a gimmicky children's toy that will break in three months
anyways?

Maggie

http://www.nasa.gov/audience/forkids...ash/index.html

http://www.nasa.gov/audience/forkids/home/index.html

http://inventors.about.com/library/weekly/aa073000a.htm

http://homeschooling.gomilpitas.com/explore/robots.htm

Get this book for him
Robot Builder's Bonanza (Tab Electronics) by Gordon McComb

or this one if he's too young for the above
Robot Building for Beginners by David Cook

You may want to dl and play around with Logo
http://el.media.mit.edu/Logo-foundation/

Here's a free dl
http://www.softronix.com/logo.html


--
Dorothy

There is no sound, no cry in all the world
that can be heard unless someone listens ..

The Outer Limits

"Maggie" wrote in message
...
Hi all,

My son is in the fourth grade and his science class just finished a unit
on robots. Now I think I have a future NASA scientist on my hands. He
keeps showing me drawings of robots he wants to invent to help him with
his chores.

Perhaps you havea future house-keeper on your hands.

Any ideas to encourage his interest without spending too
much money on a gimmicky children's toy that will break in three months
anyways?

Legos has some cool robot stuff. Expensive, around two fifty.

If you search robots on Google (or another search engine), you will find
some stores that have lots of kits, like this one:
http://www.robotstore.com/.

There are others, I think.

Jeff


Maggie

Maggie wrote:
Hi all,

My son is in the fourth grade and his science class just finished a unit
on robots. Now I think I have a future NASA scientist on my hands. He
keeps showing me drawings of robots he wants to invent to help him with
his chores. Any ideas to encourage his interest without spending too
much money on a gimmicky children's toy that will break in three months
anyways?

My 11 year old received the new Lego Mindstorms robot set and program
for Christmas. It has been a big hit with him. I like it because it
requires very little parental involvement. The basic designs are very
well documented and seem to provide the building blocks for branching
out and programming your own sequences. The robot has several sensors
(touch, sound, light) that you can set to react in different ways. It
was expensive, a couple hundred bucks, but seems like a good buy so
far.

Chris

www.flowol.com shows some interesting software, could be seen as a good
thing that you can do it all on screen and run your programs on mimics,
which I don't think you can do with the lego software, it's also a different
style, which is potentially more appropriate for the younger child (you said
4th grade, I think). Unfortunately the prices is pretty steep, barely any
cheaper for a single user license than for a primary school site license!
You might want to email and explain what you want it for
and see if they can do you a deal. I'm not sure what market share they have
now in the UK, but a few years ago, they were pretty much head to head with
lego and when you compare the company size and the potential marketing
ability, that says a lot about a product. If you son then really does get
into it, the flowol is compatible with lego robotics stuff and numerous
other interfaces, otherwise you are restricted to lego, or have to get into
some much higher end programming. Just thought I'd throw it into the ring,
it's probably not something you'd rush into buying, but given I knew about
it, thought I'd better mention it, otherwise for home purchase you're stuck
with lego, or one off kits.

Anne