K’NEX Education – Intro to Structures: Bridges Set – 207 Pieces – For Grades 3-5 Construction Education Toy

K'Nex has done an amazing job with their educational sets, and we have been using them as a supplement to our family homeschool program. The K'NEX Education - Intro to Structures: Bridges set is an excellent way to teach how different types of bridges are built. As we take family car trips, my kids always notice the bridges we cross over. We have some really neat ones in Maryland, like the Chesapeake Bay Bridge, the Bay-Bridge Tunnel, and various smaller bridges all around the area. This set helped my kids learn how all of them work.First, the set comes in a nice red plastic tray with a tight fitting lid, so all of the parts stay together. It stacks easily with other K'Nex education sets in the series. There are 7 types of bridges, with a few variants, for a total of 14 structures you can build. Each of the 7 types has an explanatory paragraph to describe the technology.The first bridge is a simple beam bridge. There is a second variant, a long-span beam bridge, useful so you can observe how it flexes under a load. The beam bridge is then improve as a truss, with examples of a Warren Truss, Howe Truss, Baltimore Truss, and K-Truss. The neat thing is that the trust could be attached at the end, so the children could see the weakness of the bridge before the truss and the strength once attached.The kit also covers the cantilevel bridge (a special type of truss) and the bascule bridge (movable bridge). The arch bridge was particularly fun, with three variants, the arch under, arch over, and arch through. Finally, the kit ends with three modern bridges, a suspension bridge, a single-tower cable-stayed, and a double-tower cable stayed.My only negative on the kit is that the instructions are not like lego instructions with many steps. Many instructions are nothing but a single picture, and it can be hard to see how all of the pieces fit. I built the bridges with an 8 year old, 6 year old, and 5 year old. Only the 8 year old fully understood the instructions without help, but my 5 year old could do it with a little assistance. For instance, bridges are symmetrical, so I would build the left while my 5 year old copied me and built the right. A few pieces required a bit more finger strength than the 5 year old could must, but the 6 and 8 year olds were fine.Once built, my kids had fun experimenting with different toy cars (not included of course) to see how the bridge could hold them. These are functional bridges that really demonstrate the concepts well. There is also a teacher's guide on CD with additional information and activities.This set is quite a good buy for the money - lots of education and fun all in one box. Plus most of the parts are made in the USA, something that can't be said for a lot of toys today. A recommended buy!

I bought this for my 4 year old and I wasn't sure if he would be able to use it, but he surprised us by making a bridge on his own during quiet time after we built the first one together. The first time we used the set he had a hard time clicking the pieces together and asked for help a lot. I'm not sure if he just got better at it or if the pieces got a little less stiff with use, but he managed to click them all together. He loves bridges (and since getting this set now knows what type they are when we see them in the wild) and has been having a great time with this toy. He also loves the long flexible green pieces, he likes to use the pieces from the set to make them into clover leaf shapes and pretend they are ramps on and off of the highway. Overall I am impressed with this toy, it's educational and the pieces can be used for much more than just building bridges. We can't wait to complete all of the designs!

I really liked these for the price and my kids loved putting them together. I bought them to go with our physics study and right away my kids wanted to put them together. The book has really easy to put together instructions, simple enough for my children to understand. The pieces are nice and durable of course you can't be too hard on them, but overall durable. I loved all the projects they could build. The pieces are all stored in a nice plastic container with an easy to get on and off lid. I will be buying more of these to use for everyday, as well as, educational in our homeschooling. Great product!

I bought a couple of these sets for my friend's children. They seem to like them and have made some interesting contraptions. These K'nex sets are pretty easy to put together with single connectors...each piece connects to others with one snap. These are different from Legos actually appearing more realistic. One draw back is the pieces are more fragile (breakable) and may need adult help with younger children.Overall, I (er, the kids) find these to be fun and even educational...A newfangled idea for youngsters.

This is amazing no words very nice

...my students - 11 through 14, boys mostly, in a mild/moderate middle school special education classroom. Comes with a booklet featuring step by step, color coded instructions to build models from the K'nex, and a CD that has in-depth lesson plans and supporting worksheets, data collection sheets, etc., in PDF. Nice. This unit breaks a basic rule I have for classroom games - not too many small parts. I sorted the parts into clear plastic bags - ahhhh, to sort. So anyway, the pieces snap together and come apart with some force, I wouldn't try them with younger boys. My guys love it. It's probably good for at least a couple of months before we've played out all the possibilities, even then you can always just doodle with K'nex, in an architectural/engineering kind of way. Nice product for this gender and age group.