LittleBits and Marble Runs

Last month I had several districts and group who were going to be using LittleBits in different ways, so I asked my kids to help me check them out. That same night, my husband also wanted to check out a marble run activity that his school would be running with kids the following day. It was time to get creative at the Keehn house! A and J set to work engineering a marble track, while R and I worked to talk about and understand circuits with the Little Bits. 

The kids used the LittleBits to create a joke handshake buzzer - you can see the picture of R's arm rigged up above, and check out the videos of both kids trying it out. Putting the pieces together in different ways allowed the kids to be imaginative, while still having some structure. R later created a flower whose petals rotated with foam and some of the bits. 

The marble run was a success (though not every time) and we had great conversations around redesign and ideation and prototyping! A was really proud of the work, and even E got in on the fun! They used tape, toilet paper tubes, and a large cardboard background for their run. Free, easy fun with great engineering applications!