6 STEM Kits Tweens & Teens will Love!

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Disclosure: This post was sponsored by KiwiCo. All opinions are 100% my own. Find our disclosure policy here for more information. 

6 STEM Kits that Tweens & Teens will LOVE!

As your kids get older, it can be so challenging to find educational activities that are interesting enough to hold kids’ attention & something they enjoy doing. With so many kids wanting to just be on electronics for their free time in our society, it’s definitely harder to find activities they can do at home that will be something they look forward to, but my daughters have found the KiwiCo boxes to be very unique & interesting.

If you’re looking for engaging, educational activities for your tween or teen, we love the KiwiCo subscription boxes as they are not only very interesting & fun to put together, but then they are items that our teens have enjoyed continuing to use or display in their rooms. These kits are not typically a project that they complete & then have no interest in using again, but they continue to provide value for them as they can use the supplies or the finished project in more ways at home.

My 13 year old daughter loves to bring  KiwiCo boxes out with her friends to do together for an activity, so I love that it’s an activity she can do on her own or with a friend. We have tried a number of different craft, science & educational kits & it’s hard to find something challenging enough for the tweens & teens, but with Kiwi Crate, we always know that it will be something interesting for them to try!

Plus, I love all of the variety in the science & engineering concepts they are learning as well as the new art techniques to see what interests them the most. It’s been helpful for my girls to try out the different activities to see what activities they enjoy the most & where their interests lie, so we can look for more projects in those areas, too.

Kiwi Crate 

The original Kiwi Crate says it’s designed for ages 5 – 8, but I’ve found that the projects really are perfect for just a little bit older and tween kids are the perfect age for these boxes, both putting the projects together & the process involved as well as the final projects to keep.

The Kiwi Crates focus on hands on art, science & engineering projects, so I like that they are still giving kids a variety of different types of projects, while kids are still discovering what their main interests are – whether it be more science focused or more art focused, etc. It’s nice to have kits with a lot of variety so they can see what they enjoy working on the most!

We were sent a Kiwi Crate box for a Levitating Lantern and even though my daughter is 13, she found this to be a interesting project to put together. It really would be a great project for tweens as the steps were laid out well with clear photos to follow to put it together, so kids shouldn’t need any (or little) help from a parent.

Check out this final completed lantern –  it turned out so cool to have as a unique nightlight in their room! Especially with the different colors on each of the sides! From far away, it really does look like it’s suspended in air, too!

Doodle Crate

My daughter loves art & craft projects, so the Doodle crates are typically her favorite as they focus more on creative projects.  She got a subscription to a Doodle crate a few years ago for about 6 months & loved having the variety of different creative projects to choose from.

These Doodle crates are geared towards ages 9 – 16, so perfect for tweens & teens. What I love about these projects is that they often include materials/supplies that can be reused again for future projects, so that it’s not just something they can use once but once they learn the technique, they can keep using the tools to make more projects.

We were sent the Doodle Crate for my daughter to check out and this Doodle Crate was definitely one of the most fun projects for her as she learned how to make handmade soap which she’s never done before. But now that she’s tried it, she loved it & can’t wait to try it again with the supplies we now have with the molds & knowing what we need to buy for more materials to make the soaps.

I love that the Doodle projects are opportunities for kids to express their creativity, too. With the handmade soap, they gave her 2 different colors, but there were a variety of different variations she could try to make them unique & special, especially with the different molds to make soaps within soaps, etc. She can now keep making soaps with more soap supplies as she has all the molds to use for making the soaps & the directions on how to do it, which were very clear & concise.

This particular project took a bit more time just because you need to let the soap harden & wait in between the different steps, but it was a project that would be easy enough for tweens & teens, but giving them the opportunity to take this skill & run with it for making more creative & complex soaps in the future once they’ve learned this skill.

And look how cool the finished product is – you can add in your own essential oils too if you want different scents & buy different colors to make the soaps! Such a cool skill for tweens & teens to learn & they could even turn this into a little business if they wanted to make homemade soaps to sell to friends/family/markets, etc, with the skills they learned.

Yummy Crate 

If your kids love cooking, Kiwi Crate launched a new subscription box this past year that my kids are loving  – the Yummy Crates. These are geared towards ages 6-14 and we felt the kits were perfect for tween & teen age kids. The Yummy Crate is a cooking subscription box that focuses on the science of cooking while learning important cooking skills. This was definitely my daughter’s favorite kit as she loves science & she loves cooking, so it combined both of her loves!

If you have tweens or teens who are interested in cooking or science or both, this is the perfect box for them to try! And if you have kids who are not as fond of cooking, this is definitely a way to make it more fun for them with the cool science experiments to do while learning valuable cooking skills. They may even find that they enjoy cooking more than they think, especially if they are learning the science behind cooking & how all of the different chemical reactions work.

With the Yummy Crate, there are clear & easy to follow instructions with several kid/teen friendly recipes that have an educational focus. They also have several science experiments involving food, too. Plus, you’ll get a specialty kitchen tool in every box that you would need for at least one of the recipes & that you can then keep to use in your kitchen.

Tinker Crate 

The Tinker Crates are geared towards ages 9 – 14 and feature projects with a focus on science and engineering.  This Tinker Project is so fun as it’s something my daughter can keep using long after she’s completed the project. It is a Glowing Pendulum Kit, where they create a double pendulum & then with a UV light, they create “chaotic motion”.   

Definitely a great introduction to engineering type of projects, too, so I love that these kits introduce kids to these unique scientific or engineering concepts & see how they enjoy putting the projects together & learning these type of skills while working on it. They can discover if they like “tinkering” & assembling projects like this or if it’s not something they are as interested in.

This kit had very easy to follow & clear instructions with photos, so my daughter felt she could put it together quickly following such concise instructions. They also have a video online on the KiwiCrate site that your child can look at & follow for assembly, as well.

This works in the dark with the LED light, so it’s a unique kind of project as you have to go into a dark room or try it out late at night in your room to see what it looks like.

The double pendulum will create unique designs with the LED light when you get it moving, so it’s fun to try to photograph or video it to see what it does (much harder to photograph that fast moving light than video, though! Ha!) Definitely something tweens or teens will love trying out with their friends in the dark!

Eureka Crate

The Eureka Crate is geared towards ages 12 – 100 and teaches tweens & teens how to apply scientific principles & math principles to come up with solutions with the focus on engineering & design. Plus, the focus is to create projects that this age of kids will want to use regularly, such as this Tabletop Tripod for cell phones. Definitely a perfect project for a tween or teen so they can put together all the pieces of this tripod & then be able to take it with them to use outdoors or indoors with creating YouTube videos, taking selfies of them or with friends, taking cool photos & more!

This involves a lot of engineering in these Eureka Crates where you are putting items together with a lot of parts, but it’s still manageable enough that it’s not overwhelming with clear photos & directions. It was challenging enough that it kept my daughter busy for awhile, though, screwing in all the nuts & bolts & putting it all together.

She was quite proud of the finished product with this Tabletop Tripod & being able to use it in so many situations at home for fun – such a useful project to have on hand!

As you can see, it’s nice quality wood so it is very sturdy & hopefully durable for quite awhile! It’s moveable with the lever to move up & down & around, too, so will definitely come in handy as my girls love to make iMovies with friends sometimes.

Maker Crate 

The Maker Crate kits are designed for 14-100 with a focus on art & design.  They provide unique types of creative projects to experiment with a new technique and learn a new skill for their crafting or art. Plus, you’ll end up with a finished project that you can display to show off your creative talents with your own unique spin to it!

With this project, it did come with a booklet, but it was more for inspiration on designs & to show you what all was included in the kit. But for the instructions, they give you a QR code to scan with your phone to watch a video on how to put this project together. It’s a bit more complicated to explain, so they used the video to show exactly how to bend the wire to form different sculpture designs.

My daughter really enjoyed using the tool to bend the wire into the shape she wanted & how easy it was to use to mold the wire into a fun design.

The Maker project was definitely one of her favorites since she loves to be creative, so she enjoyed the opportunity to put her own unique look to it & learn a new skill & have a tool to be able to create more sculptures or designs in the future with wire.

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As you can see, there is such a wide variety in types of projects available thru KiwiCo for tweens & teens – really so many options to challenge them & keep them interested and engaged. Plus,  they will be learning some new skills & really hone in on what they enjoy doing the most – whether it’s tinkering & putting things together as part of the engineering type of projects or whether they like the more creative piece where they can add their own designs & create something beautiful to display.

It’s so hard to find projects that will be challenging enough for tweens & teens & be fun & interesting for them, but KiwiCo is always coming up with such different & unique kits which teach kids new skills or introduce them to new types of art or scientific concepts they might not have learned about before. They definitely make learning more fun & interactive for tweens & teens with their variety of educational kits!