Hands-on Life Science Activities - help kid to explore life science in action!

Life science activities are hands-on experiences to help our children to explain “how” and “why” things happen.

Earth is a planet of life and life science explores the origins and expansion of living things. Children 5-6 years of age are very curious about life science. Life science activities will help to build kids' observation skills.

By this age, they would have some knowledge of life sciences such as:
- Able to differentiate “living” and “non living” things
- Understand how plants and animals get their basic needs met (air, water and food)
- Recognize the variation in plants and animals.
- Some understanding of life cycle of a plant or animal and the young grow and takes the form of its parents.

I enjoy doing life science activities with my children as it helps me to inculcate the love of nature and living things. Doing life science activities also spurs the interest of life science in kids. It is wonderful to know what God have created and how amazing the nature of wonder works.

Here are some life science activities to help kids reinforce their understanding and form theories on the explanation of “how and “why” in life sciences.

Seeds Collection and Germination

Take a walk around the garden or park and collect the various types of seeds you can find with the kids. Collect and sort them out according to the different dispersion method. Observe the seeds together with them and point out the unique features of each seed that determine the dispersion method.

My kids love to collect pods as they can crack it open to get to the seeds inside. Sometimes we brought home the seeds for craft purposes. Just use our creativity to get ideas what can we do to those seeds. I think it is great to do a seed collection scrapbook!

In addition, I get my children to learn to identify the various species of seeds and which plants or trees it belong. When we go back to the garden the next time, I play “identify the seeds” game. They are always thrilled to get the right answers.

As an extension on seeds collection, they also learn about seeds germination process during a visit to a vegetable farm using hydroponic farming method.

Kids learn seeds germination and hydroponic farming.

Grow a Simple Plant

This is one of the easiest ways to grow a plant within a week. Remember, our young kid may not have the patient to wait to see the full-grown plant.

What to do:
Put some green beans on a damped ball of cotton wool in either a plate or shallow glass. Leave it in an open area in the house where it is exposed to sunlight. Remember to water it daily (just ensure the cotton wool is kept damped)

Observe the changes happen on the green beans as roots and leaves start to grow. You can let the children chart out the height of the plant or simply draw the differences they seen on the beans in their science journal.

Do remember to remind them that plants need water and sunlight to grow.

Celery Stalks Drink Water

This life science activity shows the capillary action, the process that takes place when a plant transfers water from its roots to its leaves.

What you need:
4 same-size stalks of fresh celery with leaves, 4 cups of the same size, knife, vegetable peeler, red food coloring, measuring cup, paper towels, ruler, old newspapers and water.

What to do:
Cut all four stalks of celery 4 inches (about 10 centimeters) below where the stalks and leaves meet.

Add red coloring with water in equal parts into the four cups. Put one stalk each in the cups of water.

Label four sheets of paper towels: “2 hours,” “4 hours,” “6 hours,” and “8 hours.” (You may want to put newspapers under the towels.) Every two hours, remove one of the stalks and put it on the correct towel.

Carefully peel the rounded part with a vegetable peeler to see how far up the stalk the purple water has traveled.

Children are very curious about life science especially when it comes to wiggly creatures and the dramatic change of some animals in their life cycles. Though I am not fancy about crawlies but the children interest warrant me to do these life science activities with them.

Build a Worm Hotel and earthworm activities

What to do:
Make some small holes on the plastic bottle (this allow air into the bottle as living things need air!). Fill the bottle with damped soil together with the earthworms. Leave the “worm hotel” away from sun light (earthworm does not like hot sun light) and covered it with the dark cloth. Ensure the soil stay damped throughout. Observe the “hotel” in the next few days. You will start seeing the “path” dig by the earthworm from the clear plastic bottle.

Earthworm activities have great educational value as it teaches life science and ecology at the same time.

Release the earthworms back to the garden after this activity if you do not intend to keep them. Never kill any living creatures.

I also realize life science activities are great for kids to fully understand metamorphosis.

Raising Tadpoles

Observing how tadpoles transform into frogs was a great experience for most kids.
What you need:
Tadpoles (scooped some from a pond/river), container for tadpoles, clean water (let it stand under sunlight for 6 to 7 days to remove chlorine if tap water is used), and frog/tadpole pellet food.

What to do:
Place the tadpoles in container at home. Feed it with pallets according to direction. Replace dirty water with clean water when necessary. Watch the tadpoles grow for the next 6-12 weeks. Observe how the tadpoles change to frogs. Discuss the whole process and explain the changes taking place. Get kids to draw the creature in the different stage of life cycle.

Release the frog if you do not intent to keep it.

Mosquito Life Cycle

What you need:
Glass bottles without caps, paper, rubber bend and magnifying glass.

What to do:
Leave flowers/plants in vase without changing water or cleaning the vase. Collect the eggs, larvae and pupa from the vase after 1-2 weeks. Leave them in the glass bottles with some water. Cover bottles with paper and tie rubber bend round the neck of the bottles. Make some tiny holes on paper to allow air into bottles. Ensure holes are not big enough for mosquitoes to escape. Observe and enjoy the discussion on the transformation of eggs to mosquitoes.

Do not release the mosquitoes!! (unless you want to be bitten) They will soon die after a few days.

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