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KinderLab Robotics Expands Curriculum to Serve Upper Elementary Students

KinderLab Robotics has expanded its STEAM robotics offerings with a new curriculum to develop computational thinking and computer science skills for students in grades 3-5. Serving as a follow-on to the company's Growing with KIBO K-2 curriculum, Exploring with KIBO includes 60 hours of standards-aligned lessons and activities for upper elementary grades, working out to 20 hours of instruction per grade level.

Lessons and activities utilize KinderLab's KIBO screen-free robotics platform and are designed to support cross-curricular integration with math, science, social studies, and English Language Arts. The curriculum includes lesson plans with background information, vocabulary, and scripting to support all teachers, the company said. Sample lessons include:

  • Historical Journeys, a 3rd-grade lesson aligned with social studies: Students draw a floor map and then program KIBO to participate in historical events and use KIBO's Marker Extension Set to trace a journey on the map.
  • Mark and Measure, a 4th-grade lesson aligned with NGSS standards related to speed calculation and energy transfer: Using KIBO's Free Throw Extension Set, students program KIBO to throw a ping pong ball and then measure both distance and time to calculate the ground speed of the ball. 
  • KIBO Race Course, a 5th-grade lesson aligned with Common Core math standards on representing data: Using the Advanced Coding Extension Set, students record the behavior of their KIBOs and analyze data to explore the concept of random numbers. 

"We are proud to now offer more than 200 hours of curriculum to our customers. Paired with our existing award-winning pre-K–2 curriculum,Exploring with KIBOdelivers a seamless progression from foundational skills to complex concepts," said Jason Innes, director of curriculum, training, and product management."Although KIBO was originally designed to meet the developmental needs of pre-K–2 students, we've heard over and over again from many upper elementary teachers that older kids benefit from KIBO as well. We created Exploring with KIBO to support those teachers and students. Broadening our curriculum also allows a wider range of students to benefit from their school's investment in KIBO, while educators have the comfort of working with a familiar robot." 

For more information, visit the KinderLab site.

About the Author

Rhea Kelly is editor in chief for Campus Technology, THE Journal, and Spaces4Learning. She can be reached at [email protected].

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