Kids Coding- Cubetto Coding Toy Review and Giveaway

Recently I received an e-mail from a first-grade parent at my school. She was surprised that  I was teaching kids coding in first grade. Her three first grade boys had been talking about how to build algorithms and coding at dinner time. They went on to tell her they been working on and offline with algorithms in kindergarten. They started in kindergarten walking through algorithms and sequencing the events from familiar stories.  Starting this week they have been also using the Cubetto coding toy!

The Cubetto arrived on Friday and over the weekend JDaniel and I learned how to use the Cubetto to create algorithms. On Monday I took the Cubetto to school. Kids in garden thru fifth grade have been exploring the Cubetto and sharing their insights with me. It has been a hit with all of them! Before I share with you their thoughts let me share with you a little bit about the Cubetto playset.

The Cubetto playset includes a Cubetto robot, an interface board, 16 instruction blocks, a world map floor mat, an instruction manual, and an adventure book.

• The robot is wooden  Montessori-approved cube on wheels. The front of the cube has eyes and a smile.  The way the Cubetto’s face is facing shares with kids that that is the way it will be traveling.
• The interface board is divided into the main sequence and the function line. The board also has a big blue Go button.
• The Cubetto and the interface board both run on three batteries. That means you don’t have to plug it in to charge! You will love that your children can take them out and play with it anywhere.
• The set came with yellow left turn blocks, red right turn blocks, and green move forward blocks. Each of these blocks has a pointy side that lets kids know which way it will travel on the map. There is also a blue function block that tells Cubetto to follow the steps the blocks in the function section tell it too. (One blue block can tell Cubetto up to four moves to make.)
• It is sturdy and will last for years. That is important to me. Students at school and JDaniel at home will be using our set.

My Kids Coding Insights

My kindergarten and first graders sat in a big circle while I read them the story in the adventure book. When we got to place in the story where Cubetto needed to move to a new place on the map, they took turns adding the instruction blocks needed to get him there. They were thrilled watching it move from one map location to another. The children were impressed that it made it over the creases in the map. Many commented on how cute it was. A few commented on how slowly he moved from one square to another. They thought he was being very careful.

I put out the Cubetto as a center for my second through fifth graders visit when they wanted a break from coding online. The Cubetto center was never empty. My big kids had as much fun looking through the adventure book and building the algorithms to get the Cubetto from one location to another. They did comment that with only 16 blocks they could really only go to one place mentioned in the story at a time. Their ability to use the function blocks helped them to move further than my younger students had. They even had fun making up their own stories for the Cubetto.

The Cubetto giveaway is over, but I think you will love the new savannah themed mat and Cubetto playset available on Kickstarter.

I want to thank Primo Toys for sending me a Cubetto Playset to use at home with JDaniel and at school.