A SPIKE Prime kit sitting in a supply closet doesn’t teach anything. The kits earn their keep when they’re in front of students with a clear challenge and a time limit. I created my own challenges for this exact purpose, eight of them, ordered from first-week basics to a capstone that takes a full class period.
Each one is built around a single core skill: driving, sensing, mechanism design, or open-ended problem solving. Run them in order and a class with zero robotics background can soon be building sensor-driven robots.
What You Need Before You Start
Every challenge here runs on a stock SPIKE Prime set, no extra sensors or parts required. If your classroom set is aging out or you’re building one from scratch, my LEGO robotics buying guide covers what to buy and why. And if you’re weighing whether to invest in SPIKE Prime at all now that LEGO has ended sales, my SPIKE discontinuation guide walks through the timeline and what it means for a classroom set specifically. Short version for teachers: the app is supported through 2031, so a set you already own, or one you buy secondhand, still has years of classroom life left.
The 8 Challenges
Challenge 1 · Foundations
Straight-Line Speed Trial
30-40 min · Grades 4-6
Build a simple drivetrain and program it to cross a measured distance as fast as possible without overshooting a stop line. Teaches motor power settings, gear ratios, and the idea of programming for a specific outcome rather than just “make it move.” This is where most classes start.
Challenge 2 · Foundations
Precision Turn Course
40-50 min · Grades 4-6
A simple course with 90-degree and 180-degree turns, driven entirely by pre-programmed movement blocks, no live steering. Students learn that turning a robot accurately is harder than it looks, and that small errors compound over a multi-turn course.
Challenge 3 · Sensors
Line-Following Robot
45-60 min · Grades 5-7
Introduces the color sensor and conditional logic: if the sensor sees dark, turn one way; if it sees light, turn the other. The first challenge where the robot is reacting to its environment instead of just executing a fixed sequence. Usually the moment a class gets excited about programming.
Challenge 4 · Sensors
Obstacle Detection and Stop
40-50 min · Grades 5-7
Using the ultrasonic distance sensor, students program a robot to drive forward and stop before hitting a wall or a classmate’s hand. Builds on the conditional logic from the line-following challenge and introduces threshold values (how close is “too close”).
Challenge 5 · Mechanisms
Object Push (Robot Sumo)
50-60 min · Grades 6-8
Two robots, one ring, whoever pushes the other out first wins. Students have to balance motor torque, gearing, and chassis weight distribution, then defend their design choices when a classmate’s robot beats theirs. This is usually the first real engineering-tradeoffs conversation of the unit.
Challenge 6 · Mechanisms
Pick-and-Place Claw
60-75 min · Grades 6-8
Build a claw or lift mechanism that picks up a small object and moves it to a marked zone. The hardest build in the set mechanically. Students learn that precision mechanisms need slower, more controlled programming than a drivetrain does.
Challenge 7 · Integration
Timed Obstacle Course
One full class period · Grades 6-8
Combines driving, turning, and at least one sensor trigger into a single timed run through a course with multiple stations. This is the challenge that shows whether the earlier skills actually transferred, since nothing about the course is broken into isolated steps for them.
Challenge 8 · Capstone
Open-Ended Design Challenge
2-3 class periods · Grades 6-8
Teams get a loose problem statement (for example, “build something that can sort two colors of object into two zones”) and design their own solution with no prescribed build. They present their design choices to the class at the end. This is where you find out who actually understood challenges 1 through 7.
Teacher’s Note
Don’t skip straight to the fun challenges. Challenges 1 and 2 feel basic, but they’re where students build the habit of testing one change at a time instead of guessing randomly. Classes that rush past the foundations spend the sumo and claw challenges frustrated instead of building.
Pacing It Across a Unit
For a standard robotics unit, run one challenge per class session, roughly one per week if you’re on a single weekly robotics block, or two to three per week if you have a dedicated daily elective. The full sequence runs six to eight weeks depending on your schedule, ending with the open-ended capstone as a natural unit assessment.
For after-school clubs: the same sequence works, just compressed. A weekly one-hour club can usually get through all 8 challenges in a semester, with extra sessions for teams that want to iterate on the sumo or claw designs after seeing what worked for other teams.
Frequently Asked Questions
Do I need anything beyond a stock SPIKE Prime set?
No. All 8 challenges are designed to run on the core SPIKE Prime set with no additional sensors, motors, or parts. If you’re building out a classroom set of multiple kits, my
buying guide covers what else is worth having on hand, like spare parts and basic tools, but none of it is required for these challenges specifically.
Do I need to know how to code to teach this?
No. SPIKE Prime uses block-based coding, and the bundle’s instruction sheets walk through the exact blocks each challenge needs. If you can read a flowchart, you can teach these. Students generally pick up the block interface faster than the adults in the room.
What team size works best?
Two to three students per kit. One kit per student leads to nobody talking through their reasoning out loud, which is where most of the learning actually happens. Groups larger than three tend to have one or two students doing all the building while the rest disengage.
Now that LEGO has ended SPIKE Prime sales, is this still worth teaching?
Yes. LEGO stopped selling new SPIKE Prime sets in June 2026, but app support runs through 2031, and any set you already own or buy secondhand works exactly the same for these challenges. My
SPIKE discontinuation guide covers what the timeline means in more detail if you’re deciding whether to expand a classroom set.
Can I use these challenges out of order?
You can, but I’d only skip ahead with a class that already has robotics experience. The sequence is built so each challenge’s skill becomes a building block for the next one. A class that jumps straight to the sumo challenge without the driving fundamentals usually ends up frustrated with the mechanism instead of learning from it.
Are these aligned to any standards?
The bundle’s lesson plans map each challenge to relevant NGSS engineering design standards (the iterative design and testing practices in particular), which is included in the printable materials for anyone who needs it for lesson-plan documentation.
Questions about adapting these for your classroom setup or team size? Just ask.
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