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Last year my daughter's school hosted a STEM night. One of the activities was open ended building with Brackitz. That was our first time playing with these unique building tools. There were rectangular pieces and brackets and those pieces could be combined together in any direction to make almost anything.
I was intrigued by Brackitz, so when they reached out and offered to send me a set to try, I was excited to have my daughters try them out again at home.
The set we were sent was the Brackitz Bugz Race Park. We opened the 96 piece kit to find pieces for building arenas, obstacles and traps, two bugs and directions. We looked through the different arenas and picked one that we wanted to build.
We also tested out the Bugz. They are battery powered and have bristles on the bottom and they vibrate across the floor or table. It was almost like an electric toothbrush. Each girl claimed a bug for themselves and practiced racing them across the table.
My almost 7 year old took the lead on building the arena. She followed the picture in the directions along with the list of parts it said would be needed. I helped her a few times but she did most of this on her own. I noticed any help from me.
As the arena got bigger and bigger, we realized that we might need to move to the floor so we had more space. We brought down the parts that were already built and then added the rest to get the first arena ready.
There are four pronged brackets and three pronged brackets which makes it easier to build at a variety of angles. The pieces are well built and sturdy. I didn't have to worry about my girls breaking any of the pieces while they were building.
Once the arena was built, the girls wanted to add some obstacles. We had to be selective about which ones we wanted to use because we'd used up the majority of the pieces making the arena. That was the only downside to just having this one set with no extra Brackitz to use. You can't build all of the arenas shown and use multiple traps and obstacles because you won't have enough pieces in just one set.
The girls set their Bugz at the start and let them race/vibrate through the arena. They giggled with delight and frustration as their Bugz would crash into the walls or obstacles on their journey to the end of the arena. We quickly learned that we needed to move our arena again. The grooves in the tile floor weren't great for our little bug friends. They would often tip over when they hit the grout around the tile. We decided to carefully carry everything back to the table.
After the girls sent their bugs through the obstacle course a few more times, they started making some adaptations to the arena and to the obstacles. They continued racing their little Bugz through to see who could make it to the end first.
The next day, we got out the Brackitz Bugz Race Park again, but this time I told them they could build whatever they wanted. They still stuck with the concept of an obstacle course, but created their own arena and obstacles without even looking at the directions.
What I really liked about Brackitz was how open ended they could be. Even though the kit we got had a specific concept that we were supposed to design, there was a lot of freedom and flexibility to make it how we wanted. Also, I love that my daughters can use these pieces to build other things - not just arenas and race courses. They can even pair them with other Brackitz sets like the Vehicle building set, or the Inventor Construction Set to build other creations.
Open ended play is huge for me with my girls. They have SO MANY TOYS, but the ones that get the most use are open ended like blocks or Legos because they can use them for so many different things.
Not only would Brackitz be great at home, but they have bigger sets that are ideal for a classroom. I love the Wheels & Axles set and the Gears, Sprockets & Chains set, and the Pulleys & Cranks set for a unit on simple machines. Students could learn about those first hand and work on designing their own with a shared set of Brackitz.
Another nice thing about Brackitz is that a variety of ages can use them. Preschool students can enjoy them and upper elementary students can enjoy them too and make more complex creations. There is no limit. We will definitely be adding some more sets to our wishlist and keeping them in mind for gifts for upcoming birthday parties.