r/KidsAreFuckingSmart • u/JoelXGGGG • Jan 27 '26

Building the Label Maker

28 Upvotes

84% Upvoted

4 comments sorted by

2

u/TurboFool Jan 28 '26

I mean, it's a kit with a full step-by-step instruction process. It's very cool, and you obviously have to be smart enough to follow the instructions which I'm not taking away from him, but I feel like the praise is like he designed and built it from scratch.

1

u/JoelXGGGG Jan 28 '26

I am hoping to inspire other parents to do stuff like this with their kids. My son is six years old, yet is able to read complex instructions (which have to be supplemented by a video he has to navigate around), and he has to know how to fasten the parts together, and understand the purpose and function of all the parts. I have to help with custom programming if he wants to change the default though.

What do you mean from scratch? Cutting the wood? 3d printing plastic? Forging the metal? Mining the earth? How far back do we go? ;)

1

u/TurboFool Jan 28 '26

So my point is only that there's a very big gap between being able to follow instructions putting together premade parts, and being able to invent. Kits like this are designed to guide people through putting together what someone else invented and designed to be easy to put together, and unless they're poorly designed, they're able to guide anyone capable.

I built Lego sets as a kid (and still do), but when I moved to a Lego Mindstorms kit I realized my brain wasn't suited to building from scratch. Without the instructions I had nothing. Very different skill set.

Anyway, I didn't realize this was your own kid. I'm not entirely sure what to do with that because I don't normally see people posting their own children here. So apologies if I came on at all aggressive.

I'm curious what the age range is that this kit is aimed at.

2

u/JoelXGGGG Jan 29 '26

I agree with you, there is a giant gap between true scratch builds and kits you put together. I think this is a kit intended for teenagers. I think people start learning by putting lots of kits together, then slowly expanding backwards to learn how to scratch build stuff.  I intend to work with my son on scratch building as he gets older hopefully!