Wow, thanks all for your feedback. I am getting excited about starting this with my daughter.
Anyway, I am not worried about age. When she was 5, she had done electronics kits, programming and robotics rated 8+, although with some guidance. And it's true that they don't check age for the cont. ed. classes.
I found it originally on our district school activity website, at
http://activenet11.active.com/everg...ationMain.sdi?source=activityframes.sdi. If the link doesn't work, try
http://www.egreen.wednet.edu, then Community Ed, then classes, then register online, then activities. Scroll through to "Online Elementary Engineering Using LEGOS". The text is virtually the same on at least 3 or 4 other ed. state's websites I have found, and NONE goes more in detail on what's involved with the online part.
Even though the name is similar, it doesn't look like the box they send is one for the Engineering I, as the guide refers to the Motorized Simple Machines Set which has less than the 1000+ pieces advertised.
Dazey, you might be right about the Engineering II, which uses a different set, the Technology set with 1,100+ pieces. But the website says that Eng. II builds on concepts taught in the Elementary Engineering I workbook, so I am still missing something here...
Anyway, I hope the online classes are not just videos, but have some printed material and manuals, otherwise I will have to buy some guides online.
--> I am likely to go ahead with this course, so if I do, I will share with you what came with the course. You might want to shop around, as I found prices from $125 to $179. For our local Washington Evergreen school district, it's $128.60, so I'll just go there.
On a side note, there has been several threads about programming, and I would highly suggest to check Scratch from the MIT lab. It's a GREAT resource to introduce young kids 5-9 to programming, MUCH better and more widely recommended than the easy route to start with Basic/Visual Basic. Alice 2 is an alternative, but more confusing I think. I have been doing programming for 25+ years, and after a couple of hours with Scratch, I can tell this is a GREAT software, seeing how excited my then-5yo daughter was. Also, when I was reviewing Lego resources for hours last night, I came across one of the Lego software that looked like the Scratch programming interface, and also I found some Scratch online classes to make simple video games with it, so that's some big pluses. And did I mention Scratch is FREE?
Max
