Girls Can! Crate is a monthly subscription box that inspires girls ages 5-10 to believe they can be and do anything by introducing them to fearless women who made the world better.
Each box will include a 20-page activity book telling the featured woman’s unique story (as well as games, experiments, & more), 2-3 hands-on STEAM (science, technology, engineering, art, and math) activities related to her field, a creative play prop, a featured character trait that helped her succeed and 2-3 practical tips for parents to easily foster that trait, and more. The boxes are designed to encourage a love for STEAM, to foster creativity, curiosity, and support literacy development. With every box purchased, Girls Can! Crate donates 10% of the proceeds to nonprofit organizations working to empower women and girls.
Disclosure: I received this box for review purposes. I was not compensated in any way. All opinions are my own. Post may contain affiliate and/or referral links.
Subscriptions are $29.95/month or less with multi-month commitments. Shipping is free within the US.
Let’s see what’s in my June 2019 Girls Can! Crate!
Everything was shipped in a bright red box with the Girls Can! Crate logo on top.
A peek inside!
June’s featured “fearless woman” was Grace Murray Hopper, a woman whose curiosity as a child allowed her to become a major contributor to modern computer science. An information card listed all of the activities in the crate and the order in which they should be completed. The reverse side included tips for parents on how to help foster Grace’s curiosity in their own children.
Activity Book
A 20-page, full color activity book included the story of Grace Murray Hopper and how her early curiosity about how things worked led her to study math & physics, teach classes at Vassar, and eventually join the Navy where she created the first computer programming language. It also included additional information on computers, puzzles, games, an interview with a real coder, and more. All of the activity instructions were printed in the booklet as well.
Activity #1: Code Your Name
The first activity had us creating a necklace by spelling out our name in binary code using colored beads. Materials provided were multicolored plastic beads, a metal chain, and a binary code sheet.
First, we needed to write out our name — we used a combination of both girls names together to form “Cleverly” — and then refer to the binary code sheet to find the correct color pattern for each letter.
We used orange and yellow crayons to color in the patterns.
Once the letters were all coded, it was time to string the coordinating beads onto the chain.
A red bead was strung between each of the letter code patterns to act as spacers between them.
The completed necklace!
Activity #2: Coding Game
The second activity had us assembling a board game to help us practice our coding skills. Materials provided were a game board and 3 game card sheets.
The first step was to cut out all of the game cards from the 3 sheets.
Next, we were to lay out the game board and place all of the matching game cards into individual piles.
To play, one player was to place the “Grace” card inside any of the squares on the outer edge of the board. Then, they were to place her ship on one of the inner squares and 5 “danger” cards (sharks or icebergs) in surrounding squares.
Next, they were to use the directional cards (with the arrows) to create step-by-step directions to get Grace safely to her ship without running into any of the danger cards. Then it was up to the second player to follow these directions to see if they did indeed lead Grace to the ship safe and sound. If she gets there, then Player 1 wins. If not, the “code” is incorrect and Player 2 is the winner. My girls seemed to understand the general concept, but chose to work together rather than against one another. Hey, whatever works. 😉
Make Your Own Computer
Since there were only two main activities this month, we decided to do one of the “optional” ones as well. It was fairly simple and just required us to repurpose our Girls Can! Crate box by cutting it as instructed, and taping on the screen & laptop pages that were provided in the activity book to create a pretend computer.
Simple, but fun for pretend play. 🙂
Also included was a hat like the one Grace wore, so you can resemble her as you code. I tried to get one of the girls to model it for me, but they weren’t being very cooperative. Kids…
Once all of the activities were complete, we had officially earned our Grace Murray Hopper collectible button. 🙂
Although there were only two main activities this time, we still enjoyed June’s Girls Can! Crate. I had personally never heard of Grace Murray Hopper, so it was actually a learning experience for myself as well. The girls were already a little familiar with coding — thanks to various STEAM activities they worked on in school — so they were excited to learn even more about it. 🙂
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