How to teach your child - Science

[JudyMendes]

Hi All
I am quite interested in teaching my toddler science, but i dont know what should i start with.
I live in Canada, and heard about this program "Lets talk Science - Wings of Discovery" for early years , kindergarten and teens. U can get from http://www.letstalkscience.ca/main/wings_of_discovery%AE/

They talk about how you could use simple science activities at  home, they improvise on their reasoning and rational skills whic i feel is very important, as everything revolves around it. They have books that list detail activity programs. But these books are very expensive

Here are some sample activities
http://www.gtkpress.com/default.aspx?pid=m_1006
http://www.letstalkscience.ca/main/wings_of_discovery_-_sample_activities_early_years_and_Kindergarten/

Here are the cost to th books
http://www.letstalkscience.ca/main/store_early_years/

Hence needed to know if anyone has these books or who can share some of the science activities they do with their child.
Infact I send my daughter to a daycare who teaches these science activities on her. When this program was launched they first piloted this program at my daughters daycare, hence the cost of the daycare is very expensive.

Hence i thaught i could rather teach my child these science activities at home each day instead spending so much in a daycare. And anyway i always do with her math/reading/ency and hence thaught to add another area of exposure to her knowledge set.

[christinc21]

Thanks for this post!

[nhockaday]

Here's a few things I found:

http://www.kidsource.com/kidsource/content2/doing.science.with.child.html
http://www.kidsource.com/kidsource/content/learning_science.html

[mb52]

At www.experiland.com they have some really fun science experiment resources for young kids up to grade 8...

[Kerileanne99]

Okay, so Iwas going to respond to another Mum's post regarding science and toddlers, and stumbled across this thread...
I am using several science curriculums with my daughter of 30 months... She ADores math and science..
I thought that many of you following the toddler math threads might also be interested in a varied science curriculum for your LO!

Okay. We Love, Love, Love, the Let's Read and Find Out about Science series...

http://www.harpercollinschildrens.com/Kids/SeriesDetail.aspx?PSId=223
they are topical, so will will be highly suitable foe whatever program you go with....we tend to read one or two of these per day as part of our reading routine, rather than implementing a separate 'strictly reading' routine...I am sure many of you with kiddos reading at a high level have discovered that it is impossible to challenge a toddler reading level without heavily hitting the non-fiction!
These readers are leveled, and very appropriate/similar to the MathStart books fo math!

Also, if you are familiar with Singapore Math, the EarlyBird and Kindergarten programs offer a coinciding science program:
http://www.singaporemath.com/Child_s_Play_Science_p/cps.htm
 And
http://www.singaporemath.com/Earlybird_Start_Up_Science_1_2_3_and_4_p/ebsci.htm

We also use the following text:
http://www.amazon.com/Science-Simple-Over-Activities-Preschoolers/dp/0876592728/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1339816690&sr=8-1&keywords=Simple+science

We have a multitude of science apps and activities, but a majority are from Rantek, Inc., incorporating many Montessori zoology, biology,space, geography, culture, historical, etc., applications and how they impact the world around them...
Would love to share how you all are teaching you toddlers about science..
By the way- hope every budding chemist has checked out the FREE Nova Elements app with interactive periodic table in the app store!


http://www.singaporemath.com/Child_s_Play_Science_p/cps.htm
As well as:

[Tanikit]

Science is an incredibly broad topic. I started doing some fun with my eldest DD when she was quite young. She is very interested in Biology so we planted bean seeds and also later vegetables. We did a theme on movement and also discussed gravity and momentum - spent the time on the swings, sliding down slides, jumping and throwing things and swinging water in buckets - we have also done a lot about animals and studied different animals and examined birds (the dog caught one and it was still alive so we looked at it a lot), we watch Magic School Bus and discuss things from there, we also discuss the human body though I would like to do a more organised theme for this at some stage, we have taught the chemistry behind the baking soda + vinegar "volcano" experiment and had fun making that, we taught water filtration (is this science - I have no idea) and sedimentation by filling a coke bottle with water and sand then mixing it up and letting it settle out overnight and then filtering the sandy water through a sieve, a dishcloth and a thick serviette to watch the water get cleaner and cleaner, we spoke about animal habitats (mostly geography but the study of the animals themselves falls under science), we also did some scientific experiments discussing how we form a hypothesis and design an experiment - the experiment she choose was to see whether grass could be used as a natural colourant for green candy - we put grass into closed and open glass containers and watched dew form on the bottle lid and also saw the grass turn brown gradually (no its not a good colourant) so we could also discuss photosynthesis.

Building foundations of scientific understanding is apparently a good book to teach young children the beginnings of science
http://www.amazon.com/Building-Foundations-Scientific-Understanding-Curriculum/dp/1432706101
I have not used it though would like to.

[Kerileanne99]

Thanks Tanikit-
I just bought the book as it is EXACTLY what I have been looking for!  You are absolutely right that it is such a broad topic to teach, and we don't tend to break everything into categories of science, but incorporate a scientific approach to our daily activities.

When Alex was a year old we put up a very simple poster showing the Scientific Method...once she learned it and could understand the basics, we use it as our problem solving approach in all of our activities, especially anything even vaguely science-related. Regardless of how many science EK topics I were to give her, she needs to think logically and critically about each topic...
For this reason we tend to have themes as well, although we also tend to incorporate many of what some would call fields of study into each topic.
I can't wait for it to get here...

[A_BC]

Keri, can you tell us more about how you explained the Scientific Method to your DD? (We are quite technical at home (engineer/ architect), so we may not be that talented to explain such topic

BTW, has anyone tried the National Geographic Little Kids First Big Book of Why? It looks interesting and I am thinking of getting one (There is also the whole series of Net Geo Big Books). Here is the Amazon link:

http://www.amazon.com/National-Geographic-Little-Kids-First/dp/1426307934/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1339907432&sr=1-1&keywords=National+Geographic+Little+Kids+First+Big+Book+of+Why

[Kerileanne99]

Sure!
The Scientific Method Poster we found is fairly simple, and we will surely modify it as she gets older!
But for now, the single word topics work well, and she has learned a tremendous amount of vocabulary from it...

The poster came from a teacher supply store:
it is entitled:
The Scientific Method ( we explain it as the way to discover our world)

1.  Purpose
What do you want to learn?
2. Research
Find out as much about your topic as you can
3.  Hypothesis
What do you think the answer is?
4.  Experiment
Design a test to see if your hypothesis is correct or incorrect
5. Analysis
What happened in your experiment and how can we record it.
6. Conclusion
Was your hypothesis correct?

When I bought this poster she was only about six months old and I had yet to discover EL- I thinkit was mostly for mom and Dad! But when I put it up, it only took about two weeks of using the vocabulary and explaining as we went before it seemed to become routine!

As far as the First Big Book series by National Geographic...
We have several in the series, and whilst I like them for the info, Alex does not...she does not even like me to open them as she thinks they are 'scary'? The illustrations are sometimes more abstract.
Funnily enough she LOVES the more advanced USborne series with lift-the-flaps...although many of them seem too advanced, the simple ability to lift a small flap to discover information seems to intrigue her...I have bought them as bday presents several times and their parents say the same...
Maybe try one of each to see which style appeals to your LO?!

[A_BC]

Thanks Keri! I am putting it into a colorful diagram and printing/ laminating it right away.

About the books, I may check them out from the library first and see if DS likes them. I also have Usborne lift the flap in French and we spend a good amount of time reading and playing with the flaps. I will also try some DK eyewitness ( http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Dstripbooks&field-keywords=DK+Eyewitness+Books )

About the scary pictures: My son can't look at the boy who comes after the word "disguise" in Your Child Can Read and also the man who says "yes" in DadDude's Reading Bear  although he loves dinosaurs (always points at their "sharp teeth") and has the Gruffalo in 4 languages. So there is no way I can guess what is likely to make him scared 

[A_BC]

If anyone is interested, the simplified Scientific Method diagram is attached below.

[Kerileanne99]

If you have not come across the Handbook of Nature Study, it truly is fantastic! Although it was published originally in about 1911, the science it is describing has not changed. (although I occasionally find something to add)
I first came across it mentioned in both the Well-Trained Mind and as part of the Charlotte Mason programs, and there is a reason it is still considered the gold-standard...
Best of all, it is public domain, so can be downloaded for free if you wish...
http://archive.org/details/handbookofnature002506mbp

It is also available from Amazon, and I am sure lots of places...
http://www.amazon.com/HANDBOOK-NATURE-STUDY-Botsford-Comstock/dp/0857926187/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1340074829&sr=1-1&keywords=handbook+of+nature+study

[nee1]

If you have not come across the Handbook of Nature Study, it truly is fantastic! Although it was published originally in about 1911, the science it is describing has not changed. (although I occasionally find something to add)
I first came across it mentioned in both the Well-Trained Mind and as part of the Charlotte Mason programs, and there is a reason it is still considered the gold-standard...
Best of all, it is public domain, so can be downloaded for free if you wish...
http://archive.org/details/handbookofnature002506mbp

Kerileanne99, you are just amazing. Karma to you for the link to that handbook. Thank you so much.

[Kerileanne99]

Thanks Nee1- glad you enjoyed it!

Hubby and I are members of the American Chemical Society (ACS) and receive their chem pubs...in a recent article there was a discussion of a free chemistry program they designed, complete with home lesson plans and experiments--they will even send you some of the materials for free (in the US!
The program is designed for middle-school age children, but I have had a look and many of our young kids could benefit-
Here is the link:
http://www.middleschoolchemistry.com/lessonplans/

Also, almost every country has their own scientific body for chemistry (not to mention all other sciences!) so you might find that one in your own country (like RSC in the UK) might host similar programs!

[Skylark]

Keri, thank you for sharing, -- we liked this resource. Would have never thought of checking there    I checked a few lesons and so many things can be done with Little ones, -- we would be definitely using it!!!

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