LEGO® Education SPIKE Prime Set

Product Information

The EV3’s ARM926EJ-S CPU is rated at 1.1 DMIPS/MHz (per this forum post at community.arm.com), and an estimated 611 coremark (per zephray.me/coremark. Tie – The Spike app has lots of learning modules, but the Mindstorm app is more feature-rich for building custom programs. Are you a home user, looking for a way to provide home learning activities for children of all ages? While not meant to be an exhaustive comparison, I’ve provided a screenshot of each app and highlighted a couple of key differences. ‘LEGO Education Spike’ app

While your hub will work with either app, you will need to re-flash your hub with a different firmware when switching apps. The image which appears when you turn on the hub tells you which firmware is installed. I have been working on this review for more than a year, most of that time learning about the Powered Up components included in the set. I also struggled to decide what I was reviewing in the first place — the specific selection of parts in the set, the app that brings it to life, or the broader Powered Up ecosystem? Only included in the newest version of the expansion set – this part makes it easy to attach 3rd party electronics to your LEGO model. If the Hub isn't going to be used for an extended period, we suggest fully charging the battery before storing it. Storing the Hub with a completely drained battery is not recommended. You can also extend the battery life by removing the battery from your Hub before storing it. I will admit that these are very specific complaints, and they re anchored in my perspective as a proficient user of productivity tools (like PowerPoint), and professional graphics apps (like the Adobe suite). Nonetheless, fixing these issues would make it easier to treat these apps as serious tools instead of toys – it will also make it less frustrating for experienced adults (and really knowledgeable kids) to build more complicated programs.)

For Adult Builders: If you already have a large Technic collection and want to build custom models, either set is fine… It really comes down to the color palette (which is personal preference) and cost (where Mindstorms offers a better value). SPIKE Prime offers 4 STEAM curriculum units, 1 Prime Combined unit and 1 competition unit across a range of languages. These curriculum units are all for middle school students in grades 6-8. Each curriculum unit includes lesson plans and teaching resources for 6-8, 45-minute lessons (including an open project, 2 x 45 min). Additionally, each lesson includes 30+ minutes of language arts or math extensions. Therefore, each curriculum unit contains a total of 6–10 hours of educational content.

For Students and Teachers: It it easy to recommend Spike Prime in a classroom setting because it allows students to build some cool robots and learn basic programming skills in an approachable way. It is meaningfully simpler than the EV3 system which it replaces. More importantly, it is designed with a more inclusive aesthetic and color palette — let’s get all students excited about engineering and programming! Supports both the onboard 5×5 grid and the new 3×3 grid (which debuted in #45345 SPIKE Essential set. Develop efficient problem-solving and coding skills through decomposition of problems and algorithmic thinking

All of this helps to work accurate motors and sensors, coupled with colourful LEGO® elements, which means students spend less time building and more time learning. Storage isn’t forgotten either, with 2 sorting trays and a durable storage container included, for less mess and efficient tidying post-lesson. In addition to several of the learning modules, I have built several custom models using the parts included in Spike Prime and the expansion set. I’ve highlighted just two of the projects I built, as they highlight two main aspects of this product: Part Selection and Programming. My Great Ball Contraption Here’s an overview of what you will find in both the core Spike Prime set and the expansion set. #45678 SPIKE Prime Like all of the elements in the LEGO Learning System, the SPIKE App is available in 22 languages: English (US), English (UK), English (AU), Chinese (simplified), Japanese, Russian, German, Dutch, Swedish, Norwegian, Finnish, Danish, French, Italian, Korean, Portuguese (BR), Spanish, Spanish (MX), Polish, Turkish, Vietnamese, and Arabic.

You can turn off the hub by pressing the button and holding it down for 10 seconds till the light turns off.

Competition Ready– The first three appear to use the core set only. After that, it requires the Expansion Set, plus First LEGO League specific materials. When a user connects a Hub to their device, the app verifies compatibility with the installed version of the OS. If it’s not compatible, the app notifies the user that the OS must be updated before continuing. To learn more about the program I wrote, keep reading? (I wrote the program for both the SPIKE and Mindstorms apps!) They both also support the popular Python programming language, which is a modern general-purpose programming language that prioritizes coding simplicity over highest-performance. That said, it is not a visual language — you will be writing your entire program in a text editor. (I did not experiment with Python while writing this review, because the Scratch-based language was sufficient for my simple needs.)