Does your 5yo like hex bugs? What do yoy think of them? Good preaents?

[spookysal]

After reading about hex bugs on a thread I've just googled and read all about them.

What is your experience of them? Do you like them? Do your children like them? What do you think of the habitats? Do they teach the children about robotics like their websites states or are they just a bit of fun. Do you have any problems with them?

Deffo a good pressie if they're popular inthe dcs' school

Ds loves his but be warned they eat batteries

not a great experience here. broke very quickly and DS not impressed anyway

Not particularly impressed.

Just a bit of fun and not particularly good value in terms of minutes of play/cost

DS got 2 a couple of years ago. He watches them crawl about, laughs, builds them a place to explore out of lego, forgets about them for 6 months, finds them when sorting out his room, cycle starts again. I didn't know there was a website or habitats so perhaps they could have been more of a learning experience.

Ours are nearly two years old and we haven't had to change the batteries, probably because of lack of use.

My older ones love them and my 9yo and 7 yo have both asked for even more of them for Christmas. They have never been on the website, they just like making different habitats. They use lego and cardboard boxes and tubes as well as the normal stuff. The problem is the batteries can run out quite quickly and when they have a low battery they can't climb uphill.

It's probably one of those things that gets more use when there is a craze at school.
At our school it's marbles and they've been a far better investment!

Actually, ours just went round in circles last time we got them out. Is this a sign the batteries are dying?