Guest Author - Paula Petrie

This exciting new level of Lego allows kids imaginations to grow along with them as they enjoy sophisticated play and challenges. If you can afford it, the Lego Mindstorms NXT is a great investment. It combines the creativity of Lego with concepts of math, design, and programming.

Your child works to build balanced, working robots, programmed as he or she chooses. Kids get to build and program working humanoids, animals, and machinery, while keeping fun and the freedom to imagine with them, by calling it play.

A young teen once said to me, that there are so many toys created for small children, but once you graduate from elementary school, there is nothing but organized sport and video games. Well, Lego has taken the lead in filling this gap.

Lego Mindstorms is the single best-selling product in the company’s history. The new NXT has great start up instructions, and online support, making it possible for a child as young as 10 to create a working robot in one half-hour. I was actually amazed at how quickly my 10-year-old followed through the instructions and proudly confided that he now had a good understanding of “programming robots.” But, the NXT also has new technologies and expanded sensor capabilities to challenge far more experienced robot builders.

The brain of the robot is a 32-bit microprocessor; the the eyes/ultrasonic sensor detect objects, movement, and distance, while a "Light sensor" detects color and light intensity. The ears will allow the robot to react to sound, and tones; and the fingers react to touch and release. With practice and ability, it is possible to have your robot shoot hoops, or most anything else your child can imagine. We haven’t gotten that far yet.

Other than the 249$ US price tag, which compared to gaming machines and basketball shoes is reasonable I guess, the only draw back is that you need a fairly new computer with a good sized memory. A windows XP with 256K, or equivalent Mac.

The plus side is the amazing creations that your child is immediately capable of, and with practice, what he or she can create and program a bot capable of doing. The confidence and interest that I see my boys gain from playing with this Lego system makes me think that this is not just another toy. Their curiosity, self-reliance, and skill development in math, engineering, and programming can blossom and grow through the sheer fun of it.

To find out more about this amazing product; including software, hardware, and Bluetooth Developers' kits check out www.mindstorms.com