Plan to provide some science-related activities across the early years provision. For example, if the older children in your setting are learning about animals in their local environment, you might set up some of these:
- A sensory table with toy frogs, water, and chia seeds.
- A construction area with twigs, leaves and moss for building a bird’s nest.
- A malleable area with modelling clay or foil or making model animals that connects to both older and younger children.
Remember to keep the activities age-appropriate and prioritise safety.
Provide ample opportunities for children to ask questions, make predictions, and explore through hands-on experiences. Science should be a playful and exciting journey of discovery for children.
Make a frozen bubble
- Prepare a bubble solution in a bowl. You need 200 ml warm water, 35 ml corn syrup, two tablespoons of sugar, 35 ml washing-up liquid or any other bubble mix you have.
- Chill your bubble solution in the freezer for up to 30 minutes, then stir it.
- Choose a very cold day with no breeze or use a frozen baking tray.
- Use a bubble wand or a straw to blow the bubbles onto the cold surface and watch them as they freeze.
Nature walk and nature collage
Take the children on a nature walk around the school or a nearby park. Encourage them to collect leaves, flowers, twigs, and other natural materials they find interesting.
Back in the classroom, provide them with large sheets of paper and glue to create a nature collage. During the activity, discuss the different colours, shapes, and textures of the items they collected.
Fireworks in a jar
This fun activity is perfect for any age children, and they will love to watch the colours.
You will need warm water, different colours of food colouring, and oil.
The simple recipe will fascinate your children as the colours slowly separate and mix into the water.
Food colouring dissolves in water but not in oil. Because the oil is less dense than the water, it will float at the top. The coloured droplets will begin to sink because they are heavier than the oil. Once they sink into the water, they will begin dissolving into the water.
Sink or float?
This is a classic science activity that explores the principle of buoyancy and can be done with even very young children.
Get a large container (e.g., a bowl or plastic box), fill it with water, and with the children collect a range of objects from around the nursery.
The children then take turns dropping an object into the water, after guessing whether it will sink or float.
Will it dissolve?
This activity teaches children about solubility, specifically whether a given substance will dissolve in water.
You will need several small, transparent water containers (e.g., plastic or glass cups) and a range of substances to test (e.g., sugar, oil, salt, food colouring, rice, flour, vitamin tablets).
Before dropping each substance into a cup ask the children to guess whether it will dissolve or not.
Homemade marble runs
For this activity, you will need some tape and a collection of things like cardboard tubes, plastic bottles, and egg cartons.
You could ask the children to contribute by bringing in recycled materials from home and use this as an opportunity to discuss recycling.
Use these materials to assemble a marble run together, exploring principles such as the effect of gradient on speed.
Weather station
There are lots of great activities for learning about the weather. Here are just a few:
- Make wind chimes (e.g., out of plastic bottles or beads) and hang them up outside.
- Make a windsock (e.g., out of strips of waterproof material taped around a plastic ring) to work out the direction of the wind.
- Make a rainwater collector (e.g., out of a plastic bottle with the top cut off) to measure rainfall.
