We were gifted the Pitsco K-5 STEM Explorer Pack to play with and share our review. Pitsco is a dedicated to bring hands-on STEM to classrooms and students across the country, and I’m honored to have the opportunity to test and share our experience with some of their wonderful educational STEM toys!
This kit comes with all the materials and detailed instructions to complete 5 activities:
- Exploring Mazes
- Exploring Bird Feeders
- Exploring Musical Instruments
- Exploring Parachutes
- Exploring Large Structures.
A very generous amount of materials are included for each activity. We had enough materials to do each of these activities multiple times. The instructions are well written and easy to follow, and I liked how each activity also included a lesson.
This pack is for elementary school aged kids – from Kindergarten through 5th grade. For age and ability reference, my son is almost 6 years old and going into first grade in the fall. For each activity, I helped my son to read and complete the lesson in the instruction book before starting to build. I think this pack is a great way to keep him learning over the summer.
Exploring Mazes
Exploring Mazes was a fun challenge for my son. The lesson challenged him to draw his own maze design. It’s so much harder than it seems and it was a great way to teach him creative thinking.
The instructions also provide a few maze designs if you get stuck, and we ended up using one of the provided designs when we built our maze with the straws.
My son enjoyed cutting and taping the straws to the board to make the maze. And we all had fun trying out the maze by rolling the provided marble through the straws trying to get to the finish.
Exploring Bird Feeders
Exploring Bird Feeders was my son’s favorite activity in the pack. We had already done a very similar activity together a few weeks ago that I shared on the blog. A big difference between my activity and this, is I used a hot glue gun to attach the popsicle sticks. In the activity I shared, I ended up building most of it myself so the kids wouldn’t get burned by the hot glue gun.
This pack came with white school glue to attach the popsicle sticks and encouraged the kids to be creative with coming up with their own bird feeder design.
My son enjoyed the challenge and had so much fun using the school glue to build his own bird feeders. He built two bird feeders and we have enough supplies left to make at least two more. The white school glue takes longer than hot glue to dry, but it was just as sturdy once dry.
Exploring Musical Instruments
Exploring Musical Instruments was a fun activity for both of my kids. We all read the lessons together then they worked together to make the shaker and kazoo.
After we built the instruments we had a little concert together. The kids loved the shaker the best. It is so fun to shake and the noise is so relaxing.
Exploring Parachutes
Exploring Parachutes was another activity where we had recently done something very similar at home together, but again this was a much easier solution for kids.
My parachutes activity used plastic grocery bags. This parachute uses tissue paper. We formed the parachute with tissue paper and glue stick (again my son loved using the glue!). Then we attached string and our parachute was ready to fly!
My kids love dropping the parachutes from our balcony because it’s the absolute only time they are ever allowed to play there or drop anything from there. We loved watching the parachute slowly descend to the ground. We tested adding some weight to see how it affected the parachute decent.
Exploring Large Structures
Exploring Large Structures was my 3 year old daughter’s favorite. She is below the recommended age range for this activity pack, but this was one activity she was able to do, with a little help from me.
We had fun playing with the extra large chenille and tubes and building a pyramid and cube. We liked how this was extra large, it made it so much more fun than standard size chenille pipe cleaners and straws. It was such a great way to practice simple 3D shapes.
I recommend this STEM Explorer Pack for all elementary school aged kids. This is a really well done STEM pack with fun and engaging activities, detailed instructions and lessons, and plenty of materials. It would definitely be enough to keep kids busy through the rest of the summer break.
If you’re interested in ordering this pack for your kids or getting more information, check out Pitsco’s website for more information.
Which of the five activities in this pack do you think your kids would like best?
