Joy Sasser

[Joy Sasser]

Joel- I am a newbie also. I just got back from Tanzania working in a school to help develop critical thinking skills using LEGO, literature, and logic games. I am not a LSP facilitator, but I used many of the concepts to organize and adapt the concepts for what I needed. I used a few of the 10698 general sets plus a few other other general build sets. As Ed suggested, I also ordered extra wheels and base plates. I then divided, fairly equally, all the sets and pieces into 6 cases that had dividers (from the hardware store) and one extra case for extras and oddball pieces. These cases served 2-5 kids each which made it easier to divide up the classes.

Many of the kids and most of the teachers had never built with LEGOs (or anything like it) so our starting place was a few steps behind. I wanted them to first get used to putting the bricks together and to get a feel for what they could do with them. So, we started out by letting them pick through build instructions for animals from the book, Build It! Volume 1. We encourage them to change the instruction and adapt them however they wanted or needed to based on the pieces they had. My 12 year old son helped facilitate this as we worked with a group of ten 7th graders. After an hour of the 7th graders getting to build, they and my son then went to the 6th grade class (30 students) to do the same build. They repeated this with the 3rd-5th grade classes. Meanwhile, I worked the same build with the teachers with the added element that they were to pick an animal to build that they could then give three words that described themselves using that animal. Even with build instruction some really struggled putting the pieces together and following the instructions, while others were able to worked through the steps a figure it out. Although using build instructions would not be part of the LSP model, it was our starting point. The teachers enjoyed this and commented that they really needed and wanted more time to “play” with the LEGOs as they were just starting to see how it worked when we needed to move on. I would have followed up with more “free build” LSP type games but I only had so many LEGO cases and the kids needed them back. The kids groups did do more free build exercises during that week including creating a car that could then be powered by a balloon and figuring out what worked and didn’t work and adjusting their design. Now this is where I would differ from Ed, the kids loved adding in translucent pieces and arches to the designs in their cars. In fact, many used the arches to hold the balloon in place.

There are many things from LSP that can be carried over to the classroom and I just touched the surface of considering how to do that. The new LSP book helped me organize my thoughts so that even if it felt a bit chaotic there was a purpose and a goal behind each element of what we did.

[Joy Sasser]

Please don’t think I was suggesting that I doubted adults could learn this way. I am trying to wrap my head around how to walk through some of these steps and looking for tips that you have found helpful in moving first time users from physical concepts to more abstract. It is easier to show for examples a theme of generosity than to show a theme of trust. Not at all that this can’t be done, but how have you helped first time users make the transition into abstract concepts.

I would love to hear some examples of abstract concepts you have had users process and build, what steps you took to inspire the abstract thinking, and what were the results or ways they used displayed those concepts through bricks.

[Joy Sasser]

Koen,

Thank you for the link. I have downloaded it and have begun to look through it for ideas. I have to admit that looking at the challenges I wasn’t sure I knew how I would respond or what I would build. The questions were good, but how do you in corporate settings get adults who haven’t played with LEGO before or not in 30 years to figure out how to convey ideas into bricks? I see my kids do it, but they have played with them since they were very little. I am guessing the classroom model got discontinued because, although it is well designed and conceptually it is perfect, teachers need to go through the facilitators training and there is no money for that and the cost of the bricks. I am going to keep working on this… :)

Thanks again,

Joy

[Author]

Posts