Science Learning Tips

Making the most of your time

Here are a list of ideas to keep in mind when experimenting with science projects together.

Encourage your child to make use of all senses in discovering the surrounding world. Stimulate curiosity about the feel of textures and materials, characteristic smells, sounds, tastes, weights and sizes of things. Train the child to look carefully and to see beyond the surface appearance of the environment.

Children are amazingly curious... encourage them to find answers to questions by observation and through references, either at home or in libraries and museums.

Let the child manipulate and learn about familiar objects: a dripping faucet, the household water system, a nutcracker, an old doorbell, discarded appliances, locks and door hinges, household plants and gardens.

When making household repairs, servicing the family car or other domestic equipment, include your child. Natural scientific and mechanical skills can be discovered and developed in this way, and many scientific principles can be demonstrated in firsthand and practical ways.

Today, a whole range of educationally approved toys and games are are available. Consider these items: giving a subscription to a scientific magazine (Scientific American, Popular Science, Popular Mechanics, MAKE Magazine), an easy-to-assemble crystal radio, a general science kit, binoculars (Orion's 10x50 UltraViews are outstanding), an aquarium or terrarium (I use a pickle jar myself), a chemistry set, a model airplane, a biography of an inventor (Tesla, Einstein, or Edison), a microscope (I personally use an Observer IV), a telescope (my personal SkyView Pro telescope that outperforms all others in its class) and definitely the magnifying glass you already have hiding somewhere in your home.

Work with your child on projects such as making robots, rockets, and roller coasters or just observing the night sky on an inflatable swimming pool raft on the back deck armed with binoculars and warm hot chocolate.

Set up a space for your child to spread out and learn. Set up a table with small trays for putting things in. A small cabinet with lots of clear plastic pull-out drawers from the hardware store is always a hit. Place a large empty cardboard box under the table for your child to collect things in (I call it my "junk box") and use during their projects. NOTE: This space is your child's, not yours. Do not clean up after them. They need their own space to lose items and forget where they put them (how else will they learn?). If it bothers you, close the door.

Encourage your child to be a "collector." Provide a place for collections, even if it is just a dresser drawer, a shoe box, or a shelf in the bookcase. A sideways crate provides shelves for "display'' of rocks, insects, leaves, stamps, shells, robots, rockets, airplanes, boats, etc.

Listen with interest, encourage and ask questions, be generous with praise, enthusiasm and sympathy. You can bridge the gap between discovering and understanding and make learning fun for both you and your child.

Want to see how we do science here at Supercharged Science? Click here.

The next place to go is the Science Quiz page.

Best wishes in science,

Aurora Lipper

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