Why you should try EEME in Your Homeschool

3/28/2016

So what in the world is EEME anyway? EEME is an acronym for Electrical Engineering Mechanical Engineering. EEME - makes hands-on projects and FREE online lessons to teach kids electronics - to foster their curiosity for how things work and prep them for the STEM opportunities of tomorrow.

Each project kit is paired with online curricula to not only show your family how to assemble the kit, but more importantly, teach them how it works.

There are also FREE interactive online lessons to teach your family the fundamentals of electronics. Sounds complex, right? Not so much. I have been homeschooling for a number of years now and I have struggled with my 10 year old and his inherent desire to take everything apart to see how it works.

I am not mechanically minded, in fact if someone messes with the Wii too much I can't even use it any longer. As you can imagine my son's tinkering is beyond me and often leaves me befuddled with a pile of parts from his most recent "invention." However, this is a learning path that I want to encourage my son in, so I am always open to seeing what is available out there to help him learn and experiment with.

We began with the Tinkercrate subscription (blog post here). The Tinkercrate was fun and was greatly anticipated every month when my son would begin incessantly checking the mailbox to get his latest box. The only problem that I had with it was that the projects were only able to be done once. What that meant for me was that there were other children in my homeschool (I have 5 kids afterall) and he was the only one able to use it because once the project was completed, it was completed. The project was a one time shot and there was nothing more to do, being"used up" there was no way for another child to get any use from it.

The other bit of a downfall for me was that my son, though gifted in certain areas, is not a good reader. The Tinkercrate directions were all very helpful and thorough, but they were written directions so if he was too quick to get to the crate he just dove in and kind of followed the directions as best as he could (there are some pictures) but many times he would skip a step or jump ahead. I found myself wishing there were videos or something that would allow for him to do the projects on his own without any guidance from me.

Enter in an ad I saw for EEME. A monthly subscription service with projects mailed to our home.

I was intriuged as it kept popping up in my newsfeed on facebook and I saw a number of people following and "like"-ing the pages put up. I found my way to the website and was quite intrigued by what I saw.

I reached out to the creator and I was given a trial of the product to review for all my readers, let me tell you the creator is very responsive and helpful and appears to be a dad with the desire to bring learning to a lot of kids, just like my son.

We waited in anticipation for our box to arrive and as soon as it did my son was so excited to get to work. We unpacked the items and I was surprised that it didn't take up very much room, just a small box with a number of electrical components.

The directions were clear and directed us to go online to the website and look up our project, it was an LED Genius light. Described as follows:

With the Genius Light project, you will assemble a simple LED circuit system that does the smart thing - lights up when it is dark and dims when it is light.
Your family will learn about:
- LED light bulbs
- Resistors
- Photoresistors
- Breadboards
- Project build time: 1.5 - 2.5 hours

This is where I was sold...my son logged on to the computer and I watched the videos over his shoulder. I didn't have to do a thing! The videos were very clear and concise allowing him to see a "hands on" project being built with a voice over while he was doing the project. There were so many projects that the build time of 1.5 - 2.5 hours is to complete all of them, something that can take as long as you want it to. My son decided to work on the project for awhile meandering through a number of the lessons and then decided to take a break for a day and go back at it again where he left off the following day.

The other factor that I really was impressed by was that this project can be used again and again. I can run another child through this exact same process and that child can also use the components to make the genius light. The project is not "used up" after just one child. This is a huge plus for a budget minded mama!

We found the project to be a hit and my son felt like a little Benjamin Franklin. The service runs a $19.99 month fee, no additional shipping and all of the tutorials and lessons are available online for your student to watch and learn the how and why of it all. We were very pleased with the service, the project, and this homeschool mom was pleased with the ease of execution that did not involve me!

If you are interested, check out EEME at http://www.eeme.co/. You won't be dissapointed, I sure wasn't!