06/10/2021 - 12:50 Lego education Lego news

45345 lego education spike essential 2021 1

Today we will briefly talk about the LEGO Education set 45345 SPIKE Essential Set, a box unveiled a few weeks ago which is now available for sale on the official online store.

This kit of 449 pieces intended for children in primary school (from CP to CM2) offers something to carry out some educational and fun experiences using the new compact Technic Hub (45609) equipped with 2 inputs / outputs, Bluetooth connectivity, a six-axis gyroscope and a new 630 mAh lithium-ion battery (45612) rechargeable via the integrated microUSB port.

The kit designed to occupy two students also contains two new Technic compact angular motors (45607) a color sensor (45605) and a programmable 3x3 display (45608). As with all products in the LEGO Education range, the manufacturer offers educational outlines, here for around forty lessons.

Everything is sold at the public price of 305.99 €, a price that will certainly discourage the less fortunate of educational structures who would like to equip themselves to run workshops. Small consolation, the products of the LEGO Education range for sale on the Shop still allow you to accumulate VIP points like the rest of the catalog.

Note that the Hub Technic Compact (ref. Lego 45609) is also available for sale separately at the insane retail price of € 210.99.

45345 SPIKE ESSENTIAL SET ON THE LEGO SHOP >>

(The link to the shop redirects to the version of the official shop for your country of connection)

17/08/2021 - 17:42 Lego education Lego news

45345 lego education spike essential 2021 1

LEGO dévoile aujourd'hui a new benchmark in its Education range, the set 45345 SPIKE Essential Set, intended for children in primary school (from CP to CM2). This box joins the educational universe SPIKE composed until now of references 45678 SPIKE Prime (399.99 €) and 45680 SPIKE Prime Expansion Set (119.99 €).

In the yellow box of 449 pieces with its two storage bins, enough to carry out some educational and fun experiences using the new compact Technic Hub (45609) equipped with 2 inputs / outputs, Bluetooth connectivity of a six-axis gyroscope and a new 630 mAh lithium-ion battery (45612) rechargeable via the integrated microUSB port.

The kit designed to occupy two students also contains two new Technic compact angular motors (45607) a color sensor (45605) and a programmable 3x3 display (45608). All these elements will also be available separately individually.

In addition to the small box containing replacement elements supplied in the set, two packs of parts are provided to compensate for the inevitable "losses" over time: the references 2000722 SPIKE Essential Replacement Pack 1 (97 pieces) and 2000723 SPIKE Essential Replacement Pack 2 (4 replacement minifigs).

As with all products in the LEGO Education range, the manufacturer offers educational outlines, here for around forty lessons.

This new kit will be available for the public price of $ 274.95 starting September 1, 2021 from official resellers.

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45345 lego education spike essential 2021 7

45400 lego education bricq motion prime 9

Today we quickly tour a product a little different from those I usually talk about on the site: the set Lego education 45400 BricQ Motion Prime, a box of 564 pieces which promises to introduce the youngest to a few simple physical and mechanical principles.

This set is aimed at an audience of college students between sixth and fourth and it requires a solid educational content to cover the few models to build. Without context, most of these somewhat crude constructions are irrelevant and they are only there to serve the lessons imagined by LEGO.

No motors, electronic hub or sensors in this box centered on the "Sports science", this is about learning the principles of movement, forces, angles and interactions using a simple basic assortment of bricks, beams, gears, weights and accessories tires.

LEGO makes no secret of it, this product and the other set from the same range intended for CM2 students (45401 Brick Motion Essential) are a little less ambitious educational tools than the other references in the LEGO Education universe. They are tailor-made to try to fit into the budget of the less fortunate school or association structures and to invest in schools in developing countries. The approach is not completely disinterested, education is here an entry point to the LEGO universe and the young students will perhaps one day become customers of the brand they have known on the benches of the school.

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The and 45400 BricQ Motion Prime is delivered in the usual stackable blue box inside which the manufacturer has planned everything to facilitate the organization of the parts and the storage of the kit between two sessions. Two locker bins are provided, with a set of stickers to identify the different storage spaces and sort the pieces by color. The largest items are to be stored in the bottom of the crate, under the two compartments.

The manufacturer also provides an instruction booklet in paper format that allows you to assemble several of the models that serve as a support for the courses that will however have to be downloaded from the official website. I am not a teacher, but it seems to me that these lessons are rather well designed, they should in principle allow someone who has never run an educational workshop using products from the LEGO Education range of s. 'get out of it and I was able to verify that this is the case.

I tried to get my 12 year old son (5th) into the concept by pretending I was presenting him with one of the lessons offered by LEGO. I was able to keep his attention long enough to get to the end of the lesson and the construction phase was not unrelated to this sudden interest in principles that seemed to him much less interesting on the benches of the college. On arrival, we especially have the impression that the LEGO context ultimately only serves to interest the student who will more easily accept to assimilate a notion via a construction toy.

Preparation of the workshops, contextualization of the experiments that will be carried out, detailed progression of the different stages of the course, everything is scripted down to the smallest detail so that these lessons, lasting an estimated 30 to 90 minutes, take place as LEGO has conceived. The students also have content to download with cards that allow them to keep track of the various exercises performed.

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Eight lessons are offered, it will be necessary to show imagination to invent others making good use of the pieces available to the pupils and it will then be possible to illustrate other themes or principles using the contents of the box. In any case, we should not rely too much on LEGO to flesh out the educational envelope of the product over time.

On the inventory side, we note the presence of Technic 11x19 panels and a few frames en Medium Azure, a pump and a pneumatic cylinder accompanied by the pipes essential to the operation of the circuit, a valve that is currently found in the set 42128 Heavy-duty Tow Truck, two shock absorbers, two weighted 2x6 bricks which had not been used by LEGO since 2016 and which are therefore back, four wheels and three graduated flexible plastic elements that allow you to work on angles. The two 52mm diameter yellow balls visible in the photos are official LEGO items that are only available in sets from the Education range.

Four minifigs embodying the pilots of the various construction machines or the characters to be performed on the ski slope are provided. They come with a handful of accessories that are just there to add a little fun to the experiences and personalize the different figures. The torsos and heads of the different minifigs are all from the LEGO CITY range, nothing exclusive or new on this side.
LEGO also provides a kit of additional parts which will supplement the inventory in the event that certain items end up lost under a desk.

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The different models to build do not bother with aesthetic considerations, they go straight to the point and do not require an in-depth knowledge of the LEGO universe to decipher the instructions and put the pieces together.
You will have to dismantle one model to assemble the next one and there are only two tanks that can be built simultaneously, the other experiments sharing elements in common.

In summary, this product has a few arguments to make with a rather well-designed educational content which will, for example, be within the reach of parents who want to integrate a playful dimension into certain learning sessions at home and a public price which makes it widely available. more accessible than the products in the SPIKE Prime range with their Smart Hub, sensors and motors.

The real life of the product ultimately depends only on the skills of the person who uses it to present some concepts to his students, it will be necessary to try to go beyond the content offered by the manufacturer who guarantees only a small ten hours of lessons to really amortize the investment made. Those who judge the interest of a LEGO product only via the price / piece martingale can go their way, this product is obviously not just a simple box containing pieces of plastic to be assembled together.

We can consider that a box per team of two or possibly three students is necessary so that the different experiments can be carried out by all the participants without frustration, and at 120 € per kit, equipping a class of about thirty children will require therefore a substantial budget. Most of the concepts studied and experiences offered can also be approached with less expensive tools and for many teachers or heads of associations with limited budgets, the calculation will be quickly done.

Note: The set presented here, provided by Robot Advance, is as usual involved. Deadline fixed at August 18, 2021 next at 23pm. For newcomers, know that you just need to post a comment to participate in the draw.

For those who are interested, you can benefit from an immediate 5% reduction at Robot-Advance with promo code LEDU5 to enter in the basket before confirming the order.

Update : The winner was drawn and was notified by email, his nickname is indicated below. Without a response from him to my request for contact details within 5 days, a new winner will be drawn.

Tchogui - Comment posted the 05/08/2021 at 18:50
04/02/2021 - 21:35 Lego education Lego news

LEGO Education 45400 BricQ Motion Prime

For those interested, know that you will soon be able to buy two new products from the LEGO Education range directly on the official online store without going through an approved reseller or having to prove that you are a teacher or head of an association structure.

These two boxes of the new BricQ concept constitute a kind of homecoming for the Education range which has poured in recent years, in particular with the WeDo or Spike concepts, in a price escalation which in fact reserved the products concerned for associations or the most vulnerable school structures. more fortunate.

No motors, sensors or various and varied electronic hubs in these two new boxes, it will be about learning the principles of movement, forces and interactions using a simple assortment of bricks, 'gears, weights and springs. The public prices of these sets with a simplified inventory but which will as usual be accompanied by a complete battery of educational resources are therefore logically more reasonable.

LEGO emphasizes the accessibility of these two new products, in particular to teachers who would be reluctant to immerse themselves in more technological concepts requiring prior learning and then passing on the educational content acquired.

But the price positioning of this new educational solution imagined by LEGO also has another objective: to penetrate markets which until now were not or not very accessible to the manufacturer because of the prohibitive cost of products in the LEGO Education range.

Thanks to these products more geared towards learning mechanical functions rather than introducing them to an expensive technological concept, the manufacturer will be able to set up in countries where the budgets devoted to education are more modest than in others. The potential market is huge, and like any manufacturer working to expand their footprint and business presence, LEGO needs to find new students who may one day become potential customers after discovering the LEGO ecosystem through the school.

Both products are already listed on the official online store and are advertised as "Coming soon".

45401 BricQ Motion Essential

18/07/2019 - 15:58 Lego news Lego education

LEGO Education 45678 SPIKE Prime

Most of you will love it, but those who have pre-ordered the new LEGO Education kit 45678 SPIKE Prime at an official reseller will have to wait a few more months before being able to take advantage of all the innovations promised in this new version of the brand's edutainment concept. For the next school year, it's a failure.

The marketing of the product, which was initially announced for August 1, 2019, has in fact just been postponed to "early 2020". The first tests must not have been very conclusive and LEGO is therefore probably leaving time to refine this product on which will now be based all the educational legend of the brand (... with LEGOs when you are a kid, you end up an astronaut ...:

At LEGO Education, we hold ourselves to an exceptionally high standard for quality in everything we do and we want to create the biggest possible impact on the students learning with our products.
With that in mind, we've decided to adjust the expected launch of SPIKE Prime to early 2020 to ensure the new product meets that high bar.