Science And Nature For Kids

admin — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 14:24:29 +0000

Why is the grass green? Why is the sky blue? Why is the tree bigger than the other? Why do I feel hungry? These are a few of the hundred questions a child asks his parents day in and day out.

But by condemning children for their incessant questions, you stub out their inquisitiveness that leads to growth of knowledge. Teaching science and nature to kids is a great way to help them explore the world. A world that is far different than what they live in. You may think they get enough of science from their school textbooks. But that is far little than what a malleable kid’s mind can devour.

You do not have to set up a lab or invest heavily in instruments. The world is an open laboratory and the best way to teach your child is to take him out into the world. Stare at the moon and see it change shapes through the month. Makes notes of the same on the calendar and then predict its shape for the coming week.

See flowers bloom and question why flowers droop and wither, See animal and plant behaviour, see fish move swiftly and check how they sleep, how does the washing machine work, how does the fruit mixer grind fruits? What is the material in a sofa or a bed, why is it used?

Science is everywhere, it can be learnt and observed and fed into your child’s mind, leaving them asking more questions than ever before. You don’t have to be a scientist or an engineer to know all the answers but a positive approach towards science is all that you need.

Keep your mind and ears open and teach your children the same. Fuel them to ask questions, relevant questions not just mindless questions. Put science books under their noses and sit and watch discovery and national geographic together with your kids.

Hold mini competitions in your house with questions in regard to general knowledge of science and nature. This will encourage your children to dig into books and learn the nuances of everyday science. Being in-step with science will help your child be updated and walk tall in life.

How do you get a cold? What is the cure to it? How can you avoid getting a cold? Are a few questions you can get your child to ask and answer? Do not spoon feed them, let the mind explore. It helps build logic to form an answer. In this way children can decode science and make sense of the world.

When your children are exposed to the world or in conversation with older people they can be a part of it with their wealth of information which only you can induce them to swallow. Sometimes children get so engrossed in science and nature that they get far ahead in life and take up professions in relation to this field. But it all begins when the tender mind is hungry for knowledge.

By: Jennie Gandhi

Science Fair Projects – Complete Guide to a Winning Science Project Step 2 – Topic Research

admin — Wed, 20 Jan 2010 11:19:05 +0000

First, get yourself a spiral notebook to be used as your journal. All science fair projects need to have notes taken as you work though them. This notebook is where you will record your topic research and your project research. It should have your ideas as well as those you get from printed information or from other people. It will also need to include descriptions of your experiment along with diagrams, graphs and other recorded notes of your results.

You will want all information written in the journal to be as neat as possible and make sure to include the date. This will be your complete and accurate record of your project from beginning to end. The information in the journal will be used to write your written report. Your journal will be displayed with your completed project.

Selecting a Topic

You want to get the best grade possible on your project, win awards at the fair and learn anything new about science you can. Judges will evaluate the science fair projects on a number of criteria. You will be able to achieve some or all of these as long as you spend the time working on your project it needs, so you will want to choose a topic you are interested in. If you can, it is best to choose a topic and stick with it. Don’t bounce around from topic to topic.

Look at the World Around You

By using an exploring question you can turn things you see everyday into a science project. For an example, the grass in your neighbor’s yard is always greener than in your yard. Why is his grass greener than ours? You have a question about plants. Could you turn it into a project? If you keep thinking about it, you might start to realize there is some nutrient in his soil that is not in yours.

If you keep your eyes and ears open and you start asking more exploring questions, you will find numerous things that could be turned into a project. You may wonder about the difference in paints. There are many questions you may have, but you don’t always ask them.

Find a Topic in Science Magazines

If you find a topic in a science magazine, do not expect them to come with instructions on how to do the experiment. You will have to come up with that one on your own. Just look at facts that seeming interesting to you. If they lead you to ask and exploring question, you may have a project topic. You can even try looking into a science fair project book or Science Experiment Books.

Three Steps to a Topic

You have decided to enter a project into the science fair, but you really don’t know where to start. The first thing you have to do is come up with a project idea. Start with a topic that interests you will have fun and learn something while working on this project. Here are a few hints for coming up with a project idea.

Look at these ideas and find a topic that interests you.

People Animals Plants Rocks Space Weather Electricity

There are many projects you can come up with using any one of these topic ideas. Come up with a question you have about one of these topics. You can start off with a simple question and make it a better question. Such as, “Why does it rain?” You want to get more specific about your question. So then you expound on it to become “How much rain did California get last year compared to 5 years ago?” Good topics for science fair projects include anything that you can do an experiment on to see if it is true or false.

Categories of Topic Ideas
Check with your teacher, but usually every fair has a list of categories. You may need to ask the advice of your teacher to find the right category for your project. You must have your project entered into the right category to win. If your project happened to get entered into the wrong category, you can be penalized because the judges are required to judge a project based on its category. For a list of categories, check out the resources on the web site below:

By: Aurora Lipper

Science research » Everyday Science

Science And Nature For Kids

Science Fair Projects – Complete Guide to a Winning Science Project Step 2 – Topic Research