Instilling an interest in science with little children?

[GOG]

Bring them up to Grant's Pass to Wildlife Images. It's a wildlife rescue and sanctuary.
They rescue and treat and rehab about 1,000 animals a year.
Some are released back into the wild, some stay and some go to other facilities/organizations.

They do great work and I think the wee ones would enjoy the experience.

 

[P7M13]

The thing all three had in common was an interest in, and an excitement about the sciences. And I think maybe that's the key: kids are like sponges, if you are excited and interested in something they will latch onto that. My aunt took every opportunity to point out interesting things

I think Kristina nailed it, and it will extend into other curiosities.
An example, back in 2000, I was working on a robot I designed in the basement, changing the transfer drive from a stepper to a servo, gears, all associated electrical components, programming, etc. My oldest daughter, then 2 y.o., was with me for hours on end. She would watch me sequence through torque procedures while assembling components. I taught her how to wrench on things and different tools.
I'm working on the programming, and she comes up to me with an Allen wrench from the toolbox and a few socket head cap screws, which she had taken off the robot (had been only hand tight), beaming with pride for what she had done.
As a hobby, she now wrenches on her super built-up Jeep, which she made from an abandoned Cherokee, and uses it for rock crawling. Snapped her axle. No prob, she fixed it. Wanted a different lift, tore the old ones out and put in new ones.
I took the younger three to Seattle with me on a lark, and there was a Manga-Comic-Con going on there. They all loved manga, so I bought them passes and had a guide take them through. They were on fire when they came out. Following that, two of the three taught themselves to read and write hiragana and Kanjii, and learned how to speak crude Japanese. The third now writes her own Manga stories - plot, dialogue and draws the story board. It's pretty wild to watch the evolution and maturity of her art.

 

[Member 5605]

We homeschooled the early years and we had some curriculum that was faith based but had practical applications to the science lessons taught in there.

Add that to a kid who's top of class and a middle school student taking high school classes, it wasn't too hard to get him into it.

Practical hands on experiments and what they can touch is key. Nothing abstract.

 

[Sirius]

Great thread and lots of good input. We've enjoyed this site: Open-and-go lessons that inspire kids to love science. They seem to have a special going right now, a free year, though with limited access. At least you could try out a few lessons before purchasing a subscription. We subscribe and feel it is well worth it. Sign up with the Homeschool subscription, that's what you are doing!
Though not directly related to your question a book I've gotten a lot out of and recommend to all *.*parents is called : Glow Kids, by Nicholas Kardaras. I feel it is well worth the purchase and time to read. A bit of a contradiction considering the screen based science program I recommended above but isn't life full of those?
Thanks for asking and thanks to all who've shared. Got a few more stops on the list for our next trip into OR!

 

[clearconscience]

I like to take the fun things we do and then expand and learn on them.
I was hunting the last couple weekends and showed my kids a couple pics of the area I was in, just happened to be a photo of a large mud flow off from St Helens, then googled photos of the area with detail of the mountain, told them the story and then we watched a doc on youtube about the eruption.
This spring I'll take them up there so they can see it for themselves.

 

[awshoot]

... I just now received a text from the Mrs, who is at a school auction, that she acquired a telescope for them. ...

A decent microscope can be had for a few hundred bucks. School and Student Microscopes You have the telescope for looking large, you just need the opposite now for looking small. ;-) Anyway, when I was a kid I had a microscope and got a lot out of it even though the light source was simply a mirror. Modern ones are quite fancy.

Once they can type, you can get them some arduino boards and a grab bag of various sensors, LEDs, buzzers, and whatnot -- this is right up your alley. It's sort of magical to take real world inputs, interpret those, and return real world outputs.

And grow giant pumpkins.

 

[ilikegunspdx]

...would anyone know of a science-focused places for child-aged folks in Eugene or Medford? I doubt there is much in the way here in this podunk, but those cities are within a day trip distance. Thanks much.

My kiddo loves the drive through wildlife safari park near Eugene. Next time we are going to feed the giraffes cuz the kids get a lot out of it (adults too!). We fed the giraffes at the Colorado zoo and it was a very memorable experience their tongues are crazy long. Here are some pics from last time we were at the safari park near Eugene just for fun.


This is looking out the windshield, that black line on bottom of pic is the dash. The female was waiting to cross the road and he didn't want to give it up. He was pretty persuasive somehow...

 

[P7M13]

I like to take the fun things we do and then expand and learn on them.
I was hunting the last couple weekends and showed my kids a couple pics of the area I was in, just happened to be a photo of a large mud flow off from St Helens, then googled photos of the area with detail of the mountain, told them the story and then we watched a doc on youtube about the eruption.
This spring I'll take them up there so they can see it for themselves.

Take them to ape caves, too.

 

[Alexx1401]

Take them to ape caves, too.

Is that downtown Portland?

 

[P7M13]

Is that downtown Portland?

The lava tubes under Mt St Helen's. You get to them by way of cougar.

 

[turbo_vanner]

go camping somewhere and look up the geologic history of the area beforehand, so you can give them a guided tour.

 

[Hueco]

Science, at its heart, is a process.

It is the process of learning and thinking critically.

There has been a lot of good advice in this thread so far, so what I want to add to it is that you make time to go through the process with the kiddos.

Before you add seltzer to a bottle of coke and cap it, ask them what they think will happen and why they think that way. Actually write it down. Then perform the experiment and help them understand why what happens happened.

Even a tiny child can understand that:
- soda is carbonated, which means it has gas in the liquid
- seltzer + water produces gas
- the buildup of gas in the bottle eventually overpowers the lid and when it does...zooom goes the bottle rocket.

If you kid goes another few years and takes an interest in chemistry, then you can repeat this experiment and perform the appropriate chemical reaction equations.

If taking them to the zoo, don't just tell them what they see, like that a giraffe's neck is long. But ask them *why* the giraffe's neck is long.

Kids are naturally inquisitive about the why behind their world. The absolute worst thing that can occur, and we do it oh so well in public education, is the stamping out of this curiosity to force the memorization of simply the "what" with no care of the "why."

So, in all that you do, make sure you're fostering, nurturing, and building your child's interest in always knowing and understanding why something is the way it is.

 

[ilikegunspdx]

I noticed that wildlife safari place also has science classes, camp outs, and homeschool science stuff fwiw (don't know anything about those): Sign your child up for camps and classes to explore the world of wildlife

Here is a list of daily feedings etc FYI: Daily Up-Close Enrichment Encounters at Wildlife Safari

 

[zenbreath]

Lots of great ideas! I would add...

2 6 volt lantern batteries.
A spool of wire.
2 12 volt marker lights.
Toggle swirches.