Home > Education

Education

Parallax has been making educational robotics kits since 1998. Their line of robots based around their BASIC Stamp is world famous in robotics circles. With Parallax you can count on time tested kits with extremely well done documentation and support.

Built around the popular BASIC Stamp family
Wide variety of compatible hardware modules
Good introduction to microcontroller programming

More Info on Parallax Kits

Solarbotics concentrates on small basic robot kits that are great for beginners. Their kits come with very thorough documentation with lots of pictures to make sure that customers have a fun time building their robots.

Good for learning about sensors and analog circuits
Unassembled kits for teaching soldering skills
Microprocessor-based

More Info on Solarbotics Kits

The iBotz line of educational robot kits are an ideal introduction for children ages 8 and up wanting to investigate the fascinating world of electronics and intelligent machines.

Electronic theory behind each robot thoroughly explained.
Easy to assemble, requiring only basic hand tools.
Each robot reacts to environment differently.

More Info on Elenco Kits

Don’t let the streamlined good looks of RoboBuilder fool you, beneath all that flash lurks plenty of substance. RoboBuilder is packed with advanced features. With quick assembly joints and intuitive software RoboBuilder gives students a great experience balancing assembly, programming, and play equally.

Multiple easy to use software interfaces
Distance & sound detection
Quick assembly joints

More Info on Robobuilder

LEGO® MINDSTORMS® help students grasp science, technology, engineering, and math concepts with hands-on, naturally motivating building sets, programming software, and curriculum relevant activity materials. They behave as young scientists and technical investigators, making their own discoveries all the way.

Familiar & friendly construction system
Very popular for competitions
Large community of users, plenty of example projects

More Info on Lego Mindstorms

VEX helps students unlock the power of their imagination by designing and constructing radio-controlled and autonomous robotic devices that can lift, throw, climb, gather and expand the boundaries of experimental intelligence. By working together to create robots that perform exciting challenges, students also gain valuable problem-solving and team-building skills.

Limitless configuration options
Very popular for competitions
Great for mechanical engineering

More Info on VEX

The Bioloid system has been a huge hit since the day it arrived. Sturdy enough to stand up to plenty of classroom abuse Bioloid also sports smart serial actuators. With brawn AND brains Bioloid offers tons of features for the price. Many advanced robotics programs and research labs make use the the Bioloid actuators and there are also a lot of 3rd party add-ons to choose from.

Train your robots with "puppet & playback" feature!
Graphical programming environment with 3D motion editor
Extremely sturdy

More Info on Bioloid

CoroBot was created to minimize the complexity of robot development. By combining a powerful PC-class platform with a robust, object-oriented software development system, the CoroBot empowers you to rapidly deploy and develop robotics solutions.

Developed with Microsoft Robotics Studio
Great for research labs
Highly customizable
1.5 GHz CPU inside!

More Info about Corobot

The Surveyor SRV-1 is a compact mobile robotic platform that combines a simple track-driven base with a digital video camera, WiFi communication, and a powerful Blackfin processor board. It can be controlled wirelessly from a base computer, or from any computer connected to the internet.

Mobile wireless surveillance
Expandable platform
Remote controlled or autonomous
Control over the internet!

More Info about the Surveyor SRV-1

The Robotics Connection product line is based around their Serializer .NET Robot Controller, the most robust PC based controller on the market. Serializer is the choice for Computer Programmers that want to quickly dive into the world of robotics.

Modular Comm interface: Serial, USB, WiFi, Bluetooth!
Requires absolutely no low level programming
.NET library API and Serializer Services for MSRS

More Info on Robotics Connection

Phidgets stands for Physical-Widgets. Besides being a fun name to say Phidgets are just as fun to develop with. Phidgets are small USB modules that allow computer programmers to interact with the physical world. A huge product line of controllers, sensors, and I/O boards coupled with an extremely robust set of user APIs and sample programs makes Phidgets the undeniable leader in bridgeware.

Only a student's creativity will limit what they can do with Phidgets:

Control practically anything you can think of with a Phidget! fans, lights, switches, levers, pumps, sirens, robots...
tons of sensors! temperature, range/distance, light, humidity, motion, pressure, force, magnetic fields, voltage, current, vibration...
All kinds of user input! switches, buttons, knobs, sliders, touch sensors, joysticks...

In the classroom Phidgets are great for:

ubiquitous computing / HCI projects
scientific labs / data collection
PC based robotics
user interface design / product design

general automation projects
rapid prototyping
interactive art projects
simulators

More Info on Phidgets

Humanoid robots have been steadily gaining in popularity over the past few years. In the classroom humanoids can be used to teach AI, animatronics, programming, mechanics, kinematics, electronics, and much more. Nothing gets students excited like watching a little humanoid robot walk around!

More info on Humanoids!