Botley 2.0 The Coding Robot Review

Reviewed by Rosemary Knight

As a grandparent of a very active six year old boy, Oliver, I am constantly trying to find ways to keep him amused. He loves playing on his tablet but we try to minimise his screen time and encourage him to play with his other toys. We are all gradually emerging from the Covid-19 lockdown but as most of our children have had little in the way of formal schooling during this testing time, it is difficult trying to find a way to keep them happy whilst educating them at the same time.

I was fortunate to receive Learning Resources Botley 2.0 The Coding Robot 78 Piece Activity Set to review, which teaches children from the age of five how to code in a really fun way. Botley 2.0 is an updated version of the original award winning Botley The Coding Robot so I was quite excited at the prospect of discovering all the ways to make education cool for my grandson. It is so hard trying to get children away from their screens, so Botley 2.0 is a great alternative, allowing them to learn coding in an enjoyable screen-free way.

On opening the box, we discovered Botley 2.0, a bright blue coding robot, complete with remote programmer with basic arrow function keys, and lots of accessories guaranteed to keep a child entertained. I inserted three AAA batteries into Botley 2.0 and another two into the remote programmer and Oliver was then ready to start coding. We began by reading through the instruction booklet to give us an idea how to start coding the robot. The buttons on the controller are quite large so are easy for little fingers to get to grips with and are clearly identified as forward, backward, right, left etc. so are quite simple to understand. You add steps in each sequence so the Botley can perform different tasks always ensuring that each sequence is cleared by pressing the clear button. As Oliver has already learned coding at school, he found it relatively simple to programmed the Botley 2.0 to perform basic tasks.

As well as the robot and remote programmer, the 78 piece activity set contains 2 sets of detachable robot arms, 40 coding cards, 6 coding boards, 8 sticks, 12 cubes, 2 cones, 2 flags, 2 balls, 1 goal and 1 glow-in-the-dark sheet.
The Botley 2.0 can be programmed to perform a sequence of 150 steps, move in 6 directions, play music, can be transformed into a police car, ghost, train and more and can even put on a light show.

The 40 coding cards a a really good visual aid for coders as Oliver was able to select the cards to guide Botley 2.0 and manoeuvre it in the required direction. There are 6 boards which slot together like a jigsaw puzzle and Botley can be programmed to move along in any direction. On the reverse side of the boards, there is a a white background with thick black lines which again can be used for moving the robot along. The accessory kit also contains detachable robot arms, a mask, obstacles, footballs, a goal and a sticker sheet so the robot can be customised. Oliver was easily able to programme the robot to move past the many obstacles. One really fun activity was turning Botley 2.0 into a ghost and there are many other different enjoyable activities for children to get to grips with. The Botley 2.0 really is a fabulous fun, educational toy which is guaranteed to keep young children happy for hours.

Rating: 5/5

RRP: £85.00

This product is available to buy from the Learning Resources website here.