Code & Go Robot Mouse


Who is Code & Go Robot? 

He is a blue or purple mouse. How does the robot mouse work? Switch the mouse on, you have two options in speed norm and hyper. On the back of the mouse you have 7 buttons:
  • Blue arrow: forward 
  • Orange arrow: rotating right 
  • Purple arrow: rotating left 
  • Yellow arrow: backwards 
  • Round green button: go 
  • Round yellow button: clear
  • Round red button: random action of moving forward, backwards or making a funny sound. 

What can a programmable robot teach? 

  • Problem solving 
  • Self-correcting errors 
  • Critical thinking 
  • Analytical thinking 
  • If-then logic 
  • Working collaboratively with others 
  • Discussion and communication skills 
  • Calculating distance 
  • Spatial concepts 

How to introduce Code & Go Robot Mouse? 

Get some stories from the toddlers

Start with a conversation with the toddlers. What is a robot? What can it do, how do they work. No answers are fault, it is like out loud  brainstorming. Maybe some children have robot's at home and can bring them into the classroom and talk about in circle time. 

Time to play

The first stage of working with a robot is to let the toddlers explore what it can. Don't interfere too much in this process it is important that they discover it by themselves by trying. Later you can make assignment cards or give them instructions.

I made wooden arrows and crosses in the Fablab. Before I used laminated cards but in my opinion I think it is nicer to use wooden arrows are more hands on. But for the mouse it can be more useful to work with the colored arrow cards see picture above. 

When the children are ready for a more complex activity I ask them to find all the cheese (crosses) in the labyrinth. Then they need to count how many steps they need to take in the different directions. The children need to place them selves into the robot. this asks a lot of engagement of the children.



My own experiences

At my trainee school BSB I did a workshop with the robot mouse, blue-bot an the blue-bot with tactile reader in 3 different classes age of 4-5 year olds . I experienced that the robot mouse was more difficult then the blue-bot. With the mouse it took the children longer to figure out how it worked. Most children thought that the mouse would go sideways instead of turning right or turning left. The round red button also confused the children, because it is a random action. They think also that the red button is to clear instruction but that is the yellow one. My first thought was also that the red one would be clear instruction, so I understand their confusion. 

The purpose of this short introduction with different children was to find out witch ones would work for kindergarten and to see if it would be interesting for the school to invest in them.

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