The power of those little Lego bricks is a formidable thing. I chose the first ‘LEGO® Education’ module ever to come to Mary Immaculate College as my speciality during the final year of my degree and I had no idea what to expect. “I get to play with Lego for college?”. This seemed like a great idea to me. I had no idea about the world of LEGO® Education and the journey I was about to begin with it.
As a teacher, you hope that your students will find some kind of motivation to engage with the content being taught. Sometimes they need encouragement to muster up this motivation and sometimes they have an intrinsic motivation independent of an outside influence. When I first taught through LEGO® Education, I was blown away at the power it had to motivate students to learn abstract concepts like mathematics, physics, engineering and much more. Lego naturally is the perfect breeding ground for concretising this learning. When you learn through Lego, you learn through play. We all naturally learn through play – but the games become a bit more complicated when we grow up!
I have watched children in classrooms and in our summer camps grasp understandings of complex robotics and programming, mechanical engineering and much more while having so much fun. There is something so satisfying and wonderful about creating something with your hands that was at first just a pile of stuff. Suddenly, after a few hours, you have a beautiful structure, or a crocodile that can eat things, or a world all of your own. Lego really is a great ode to the power of the human potential and it gives children the opportunity to create something that existed in their imagination. Or it gives the opportunity to follow detailed instructions precisely and to produce a product. These are all hugely important skills that develop critical thinking, reasoning, fine motor-skills, patience and so much more.
In our Summer Camps, partnered with Learnit©, one of the most fantastic things about them is the communication skills and co-operation that goes along with building the creations. Our young engineers work in pairs and groups and learn to work together, to use the best of everyones skills to create a brilliant product. It is such a fun, lively, hands-on and collaborate experience. We like to have music playing and create a real sense of enjoyment for the day. The children’s parents are always blown away by what has been created from when they arrive to clear desks in the morning.
If you haven’t come across LEGO® Education before, I would highly recommend it for classroom and home use alike slovenska-lekaren.com. The world of LEGO® Education is one that you will come away from having both hugely enjoyed and learned so much.
