Fun LEGO computer coding for kids! Technology is a huge part of our lives today. My son loves his iPad and although we monitor his use of it, it’s a part of our home. We also love LEGO® and have tons of fun building neat contraptions and gadgets with our bricks. We have played around with a couple fun ways to check out computer coding with LEGO® with and without a computer. Make sure to check out our new book, The Unofficial Guide to Learning with LEGO®!
Fun Ideas for LEGO Computer Coding Activities
LEGO Computer Coding Makes Learning Exciting
Computer coding with LEGO® is a great introduction to the world of coding using a favorite building toy. Yes, you can teach young kids about computer coding, especially if they are highly interested in computers and how they work. My son was astounded to hear that a person actually wrote/designed the Minecraft game. We even had to use the iPad to look up more about this guy. With the realization that my son could very well make his own game someday, he was pretty interested to learn more about computer coding.
How can you combine computer coding and LEGO®?
There are a few ways you can combine computer coding with LEGO® for the younger crowd or depending on the skill level. My son is kindergarten age, and is also highly interested to learn more at this time. You can test out the world of computer coding on and off the computer.
Bits and Bricks, LEGO® Hour of Code
I was introduced to the Bits and Bricks Campaign, an online computer coding game made by LEGO®. It is part of the Hour of Code initiative aimed towards kids as young as 5 and 6 to get them excited about computer coding. Hour of Code is a global project reaching millions of kids. You can find many versions of Hour of Code to try out. Of course, the LEGO® lovers that we are, we enjoyed working with Bit the Bot.
Play Around With The ASCII Binary Alphabet
Our computers don’t read the letter A like we read the letter A. The computer has a special code called the binary alphabet where each letter, both upper and lower case is assigned a set of numbers containing 1’s and 0’s. My son first encountered this at school, but it was an activity for an older grade. He was curious so I read up on the binary alphabet here and showed him how it worked. Mom has some learning do too! We made a computer coding Christmas ornament. You can also take a base plate and LEGO® bricks and play around with the binary code.
Click on photo to download and print this sheet.
1= White 0= Blue
Build Mini LEGO® Robots
LEGO computer coding doesn’t have to be just about the computer. Grab a bin of LEGO® pieces including the neat, super tiny pieces and see if you can make your Bit the Bot from Bricks and Bits. Can you use your LEGO® bits to make a robot.
Create a DIY LEGO® Coding Game
You have a robot made, now make a coding game for it. Create a world with obstacles. Make movement cards including forward, right turn, and left turn. Set a challenge with a start and a finish and code your Bot to get through the obstacle. lay out the direction cards to plot the robots movement than try out your code and see if you are right! Create a new challenge and try again. It’s a fun way to play with code and LEGO®!
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These fun ideas for LEGO® computer coding activities are a great introduction to computer coding with and without the computer. Young kids can learn to code. Parents can learn about code too. Try computer coding with LEGO®! You will love it!
LEGO Computer Coding for Play and Learning
NEW! THE UNOFFICIAL GUIDE TO LEARNING WITH LEGO®!
We LOVE LEGO. Check out our LEGO play ideas. Click photo.
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Eva /Kid Minds
These are fun ideas! I would love to learn more about coding and this looks like a good introductory guide.
littlebins
Thank you! My son really enjoyed working on them together. We are still building robots!
JDaniel4's Mom
This is way cool! I love the idea of using LEGO to code!
Herminia Gomez
On your ASCII binary alphabet, why are W and X the same binary number? Please correct this.
Ronalea
This is so awesome! I would love to use this on my classroom! Did you buy a special set of Legos to build Bit? And for the coding?
Thank you!!!
littlebins
Nope! We just used our collection of LEGO which is growing. Super tiny pieces are great for robot building. The game board I made was just our LEGO bricks and could be any color any design. I just happened to have some of the colors associated with the coding program on the LEGO site! Let me know if you need anything else!
Dawn
It’s nice to find this guide to help our teachers introduce coding at a young age.
Thank you for sharing.
Heather
Thank you so much for putting this together. My kids had a great time doing this yesterday. Just so you and your readers know letter W and X are the same on the worksheet. Letter X should read 1011000.
littlebins
Oh thank you!
Chris
OMG they’re thinking of everything. Must admit I love this idea, spending more time creating something that will support much more analytic skill sets as opposed to building the latest star wars spacehsip!
haha