Animatronics Kits for Learning

Fun & Games Robotics Technology
Animatronics Kits for Learning
(c) Ian Cole / Pat Starace
Still from video by Ian Cole / Pat Starace

I just stumbled across the Star★Bot animatronic platform kit out of the community of makers in Florida. It’s designed for kids to “create animatronic robots and learn microcontrollers, mechanics and papercraft.” Its Kickstarter campaign ends in a few hours! Pat Starace developed the kits at FamiLAB “Central Florida’s provider of space, tools, and community for creative technical learning and projects.” (All the organizers for the Orlando Mini Maker Faire met at FamiLAB.)

Human model included in all kits. Toon and Toonimal included in StarBot Menagerie Kit.This campaign’s fully funded, but you can sneak in your support to get some of the kits into your hands. Get one for the maker, teacher, puppeteer, hacker in your life…or even an aspiring writer, playwright, or filmmaker! They offer acrylic bases for Humans or larger-eyed Toons and Toonimals.

Pat displayed the kits at the Orlando Mini Maker Faire last month and the Miami Mini Maker Faire last weekend. And Orlando gets a big plug in this mischievous little dragon’s hilarious video by Ian Cole.

Coming across this, I was reminded of Animatronics Workshop, a terrific site by Paul Dietz, about introducing programming and interactive design to kids.

4 thoughts on “Animatronics Kits for Learning

  1. chuck says:

    Woot! Familab is awesome. Orlando is doing some amazing things, makerwise. With Tampa’s CIC coming on line soon, Florida is turning ‘the State of Making’.

  2. ameyring says:

    Cool kits for all kinds of displays. Hopefully they’ll be available for retail soon.

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Michelle, or Binka, makes . While at Maker Media, she oversaw publications, outreach, and programming for kids, families, and schools. Before joining Maker Media in 2007, she worked at the Exploratorium, in Mitchel Resnick’s Lifelong Kindergarten group at the MIT Media Lab, and as a curriculum designer for various publishers and educational researchers. When she’s not supporting future makers, including her two young sons, Binka does some making of her own, most often as a visual artist.

View more articles by Michelle "Binka" Hlubinka

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