Reviews for Hack the Laptop That Teaches Kid to Code
Make your own laptop. Acquire to code. Hack Minecraft. The tantalizing promise of Kano's Computer Kit Complete ($250 at Target and Kano'due south website) is made clear right on the front of its brightly colored packaging. This charming kit for kids contains everything y'all need to build a Raspberry Pi 3-powered PC, explaining the basic concepts behind every step of building a computer, then seals the deal with a friendly operating system designed from the basis up to teach children the thought processes crucial to coding. And every step is fun!
I'm not proverb that as a grizzled PC edifice veteran. I didn't build the Kano Computer Kit Complete myself. I oasis't fifty-fifty touched its keyboard once. For this review, I just handed the box to my second grader and watched what happened. Spoiler alarm: She absolutely adores it.
Building the Kano Computer Kit Complete
"Make your own laptop" is a bit misleading, as the Kano Figurer Kit Complete's wireless keyboard is separate from its screen. Calling information technology a portable PC would be more accurate. Here'southward what you'll discover inside the vibrant packaging, courtesy of the Kano website:
Kano What's inside the Kano Estimator Kit Complete. (Click to enlarge.)
All the parts are fatigued and clearly labeled in the child-friendly educational activity transmission. Even better, Kano color-coded the parts to indicate what function of the arrangement they affect. The Raspberry Pi and its USB hub are green, power-related components blaze bright reddish, external accessories are orange or blue, and the blocks that keep your hardware and cables secure are grey. It's a great affect, and really helped my child stay organized as she built the machine.
I tin can't sing plenty praises about the didactics transmission. Every page uses articulate, simple language and large illustrations to get in abundantly clear what each step should exist. The volume is long—80 pages—but that's considering it devotes a single folio to every private step taken. My daughter had no trouble following along, reading each sentence out loud.
Kano She particularly liked how the manual mixes in bones data most the hardware itself, and what each component does. "This cable volition carry pictures from your reckoner to your screen," the HDMI cable installation explains, for instance. "It sends images, videos, and more as binary code." That built off an earlier description of the Raspberry Pi "brain," which thinks using "billions of electric switches," Kano explained. The manual excels at integrating high-level hardware knowledge in easy-to-empathise language.
The transmission's clarity made assembling the laptop a breeze, even for a second-grader. Y'all first past installing the ability switch and microSD card—loaded with the custom Kano OS operating arrangement—into the Raspberry Pi, then go most slotting the various components into their designated places behind the screen. The display sits in a clear, triangular housing that doubles every bit your figurer instance. When your child needs to install a wire, Kano's transmission shows exactly which ports it plugs into, followed by a pulled-back illustration of the entire system, showing the optimal way to road your cables. And again, each is colour-coded. It's delightfully straightforward and child-friendly.
My daughter only ran into two minor hiccups during the procedure. The large, ruddy bombardment included with the Kano Estimator Kit Complete doesn't sit down well on its holding pegs. It tends to fall off those pegs and clatter to rest at the lesser of the case, even if you try pushing information technology downward actually hard. Amazon reviews mention this mishap oftentimes.
Kano The Kano Computer Kit Complete teaches kids hardware concepts as they build.
A bigger bummer: The Kano Computer Kit Complete didn't boot upwards at first. My daughter was crushed. Fortunately, the mistake was ours, and the transmission'south teachings fifty-fifty helped her figure out the issue herself—which made her feel like an absolute estimator goddess.
Subsequently thinking almost the cadre issue for a moment—the computer won't turn on—she decided the best place to showtime troubleshooting was the power organisation, color-coded in red. Studying her setup and the manual, she soon realized (with a petty help from dad) that she'd plugged the bombardment's micro-USB ability cablevision into the Raspberry Pi's micro-USB port, rather than into the micro-USB port built into the Kano's power switch. The transmission illustrated it correctly; she'd just fabricated a fault. After swapping that around, the kit booted right upwardly. Success!
"Make certain you tell other kids nearly that dad, so they don't make the fault too," my girl implored, then hither you become. Several Amazon reviews for the Reckoner Kit Consummate say it fails to boot, so I wouldn't be surprised if this were a adequately common error.
Kano Reckoner Kit Complete software
But building your own hardware is merely half of the Kano Reckoner Kit Consummate's appeal. The other star of the prove is Kano Bone, the custom operating system Kano created to teach kids coding concepts in incredibly fun ways.
Kano The setup process introduces children to the Linux Terminal's command line interface.
The fun begins with the initial setup feel. Initializing most Raspberry Pi operating systems is a tedious procedure full of control line entries. Kano OS does the same, only makes the process fun. After creating a user contour, Kano Os asks kids to perform simple command tasks that tap into the reckoner'south capabilities and generate fun interactions on-screen—activating the voice sensor to generate visual waves that respond to singing and shouting, for example. It's a nail, and because the process just lasts a few minutes, my daughter didn't wind up bored and bogged downwardly.
Kano The Kano Bone desktop.
Later on that, children customize a cheerful avatar similar to Nintendo's Miis, and have the option to create a complimentary Kano World account. And so yous're dropped onto the bright, colorful desktop with no guidance whatsoever—just a screen full of apps and options, including YouTube, productivity apps, and a web browser. A large icon for Kano's Story World app dominating the left side of the desktop interface suggests that'due south the preferred starting point, but given how well-guided the Kano Computer Kit Complete experience was up until now, but being plopped on the desktop felt jarring. For the showtime time, my girl asked me what to do next.
Kano Hacking Minecraft.
Merely she quickly answered that question herself, leaping headfirst into Hacking Minecraft—a version of Minecraft: Pi Edition that teaches kids coding concepts using the Scratch programming language for children. Using Scratch, my daughter performed predefined tasks such as automatically generating a road when she walks or digging massive holes into the earth when she pressed a push, and within mere minutes, she grasped the concepts enough to adjust the code to create custom scripts—for example, creating a house with the word "HOUSE" spelled throughout it, made entirely of TNT. Boom. She's spent hours tinkering with the app.
Kano Scratch in action.
The rest of Kano OS's apps are just as informative, and simply engaging. Information technology'southward loaded with utilities like Make Pong, Brand Ophidian, Make Art, Brand Light, Last Quest, and Scratch itself. Kano Code is specially enjoyable. Information technology lets you lot piece code blocks together to perform tasks like making the Calculator Kit Complete say whatever yous want. Prepare yourself for lots of sentences with words like "butt" and "BFF" in them, fellow parents.
Kano Kano'southwardStory Modeis a cheerful chance that teaches hardware and coding concepts.
In that location is a ton of stuff to do with Kano OS, and Story Mode brings it all together. The app's basically an 8-fleck role-playing game that teaches you the in and outs of coding concepts, how hardware works, and the rest of the software on the system. Story Manner's Power Path teaches yous almost the estimator's ability requirements, for example, and Python Jungle introduces kids to the Linux Terminal. Other characters gently teach virtually the nuts of stereo audio, Wi-Fi, and UDP packets, but it's always done in very outgoing, interactive means.
Bottom line: Great for geeky tykes
Expect, the Kano Computer Kit Complete ($250 at Target and Kano'south website) isn't chest-clutchingly expensive, but information technology isn't exactly cheap, either. $250 is a sizeable investment if you lot aren't certain your kids are interested in deeper estimator knowledge. Fortunately, Kano also offers Kano Bone at no cost if you just want to load it onto a $35 Raspberry Pi, giving you the bones functionality of the Computer Kit Consummate's software, albeit without the voice sensor features. It's yet another outstanding applied project for the Raspberry Pi.
[ Further reading: Best Raspberry Pi 3 kits: 8 options for beginners and experienced makers ]
But you don't get the entire experience if you exercise that. The software alone is just part of the Kano Computer Kit Complete'south allure. The human activity of building the PC, of learning plenty most hardware concepts to be able to troubleshoot the ability issue, of being able to interact with the hardware sensors filled my daughter with joy—and with deeper cognition that she wouldn't have gained by simply slapping a microSD with Kano Bone into a Raspberry Pi. The computer's Story Way builds on that knowledge, layering on hardware and coding concepts in ways that never get tedious or frustrating. And the final product is much more than kid-friendly than, say, a $300 Chromebook.
Kano I'one thousand thrilled Kano sent me the Calculator Kit Complete for review. My 2nd-grader felt an overwhelming sense of accomplishment later on she built the automobile and afterward she created her first advertising-libbed Minecraft script in Scratch—the smile on her face was priceless. Ameliorate nonetheless, she knows a whole lot more than at present than she did a few weeks ago, and she's still yearning to get a crack at the matter when her chores are washed.
The Kano Computer Kit Complete aims to teach kids virtually PC hardware and coding in a fun and engaging way, and it knocks it out of the park. This kit is highly, highly recommended if you lot've got an elementary- or centre-schoolhouse child with an interest in geekier topics—fifty-fifty if it'south non really a laptop.
Source: https://www.pcworld.com/article/407848/kano-computer-kit-complete-review.html
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