THINGS YOU NEED TO MAKE YOUR SPIDER OOBLECK:

1. Cornstarch

2. Water

3. Googly Eyes/Plastic Creatures(any little objects)

4. Tweezers

5. Cookie Sheet

HOW TO MAKE YOUR OWN SPIDER OOBLECK:

1. Simply mix up about a cup of cornstarch and 1/2 a cup of water! You can adjust the ratios as needed.

2. Pour and spoon onto a cookie sheet and stick in your goodies (really anything can be used for sticking into the oobleck!).

3. Add a pair of tweezers and play!

Collect up some chair making materials from around your home. Good materials might include toilet paper and paper towel rolls, recycled bottles and containers, masking tape, Lego or Duplo blocks, pipe cleaners, cardboard and scissors. Can you use these to create a chair for your favourite teddy bear? Put your chair to the test. If your teddy is too heavy for the chair, what is it about your design that you need to change? Change one thing and try again. Remember that good engineers never give up! Draw a picture of your chair and write about it in your learning journal.

Click on the picture to the left and enjoy a slideshow of some amazing animal photographs.

While in your garden, or on a walk, try to take some interesting photos of animals you find. After it has rained you often find worms that have come to the surface. How close can you get to capture detail in your photo?

Can you sketch the main features you captured in your photo?

Can you search online and record 3 interesting facts about the animal you have photographed?

You could be a future Wildlife Photographer of the Year!!

Writing Challenge

Have a go at writing a recount. What did you do? What happened?

See if you can start your sentences with first, next and then. Can you include a conjuntion and a WOW word?

What you need:

Milk

Different food colouring

Dishwashing liquid

Cotton buds

What to do:

1. Pour a thin layer of milk in a shallow dish.

2. Add drops of food coloring all around in the milk.

3. Pick up a cotton bud and dip it in the dish soap.

4. Then put the cotton swab in the milk – pressing it down in one spot and hold it there for about 15 seconds.

Watch what happens!

You will need

• One raw egg

• White vinegar

• A jar that the egg fits into and a lid

Gently place the egg inside the jar and cover with white vinegar. Put the lid on the jar. After 24 hours, drain the vinegar away and replace it with fresh vinegar. Set it aside and patiently wait for 7 days. Yes. 7 whole days! While you are waiting, hone your powers of observation. What is going on inside the jar? What do you see?

Gently play with your egg on a smooth surface. What does the egg feel like? Can you make it do a little bounce? What happened to the shell? Does light pass through it? What happens if you repeat the experiment and put food colouring in with the vinegar at the start? Do some research online... can chickens actually lay eggs like this? If you think yes, why? Record your discoveries in your learning journal!

Starfish are super interesting. They are actually echinoderms (spiny skinned sea urchins, related to kina). They're not really fish. They can't swim and they do not use gills to breathe like fish. They are also ferocious predators!

Watch the BBC video about starfish and the important role that they play in our oceans.
Then follow the instructions below and draw a starfish in your learning journal!

The swirling winds of a twister are called a vortex. In this experiment you will make a vortex that looks like a real tornado! While real twisters happen in air, the vortex you make in this activity is in water. Both air and water are fluids. That means that they move in similar ways.

What you will need:

240ml Jar with lid

Water

Vinegar

Clear liquid dish soap

A pinch of glitter

Get outside on a fine day with a wooden spoon and a bowl and make yourself a potion! Find interesting flower petals and leaves for your potion. Daisies, dandelions and lavender flowers are perfect!

If you want to take potion making to a new level, try adding some of these awesome extras.

• mud or sand

• wood shavings or bark

• mortar and pestle for grinding and pulverising

• chalk to grind into powder

• food colouring

• baking soda and a container of vinegar for fizzy potions

• measuring cups and jugs

• plastic scoops

• pipettes

• tongs and/or tweezers

Write a story in your learning journal about your potion. You can write like a scientist and record each step you took to make your potion. Or you can write like David Walliams and create a story about who your potion is for and what they will use it for!

Important note: If your caregivers are trying to grow vegetables, don't use these in your potion. If you're not sure whether to pick something or not, make sure you ask first!

Do you like going to the Museum? I love visiting them all over the world. Right now we can't go exploring, so the next best thing is to take a virtual tour.

Watch the BBC video about Venus Fly Traps and learn what makes them so successful.

Then, in your learning journal, design and draw a plant that eat insects.

Your plant will need roots (to get water from the soil) and leaves (to make food) but it will also need to trap insects. It might do this by:

• trapping the insect in a cage of some kind

• drowning the insect

• making the insect stick to it

• having a trap that’s easy to get in but impossible to get out.

Give your plant a name and describe how it traps insects.

Choose the best thing you have learned about in the Science section. Maybe you're a volcano guru. Maybe you're fascinated with praying mantids? Or maybe starfish or even Venus Fly Traps? Click on the video and learn how to make your very own mini book. Record your favourite facts about your best subject. Remember to draw and label pictures about your facts too!

Watch the video, follow the instructions and draw a praying mantis in your learning journal. Can you label the thorax, the eyes, the antennae, the wings, the abdomen and the legs?

Did you know that you can make a candle from a banana and an almond? It is really important that you ask for help from the big person in your house before you start this as you will need matches too. You will need to cut the banana in half so that it can stand upright on a plate. Next, you will need to get an almond and scrape or cut the skin off it. If you have blanched almonds you can skip this step. Next cut the almond in half length ways and position it in the top of the banana. Ask your big person if you can use the matches or ask them to light it for you. Does your candle burn? What is in almonds that can make the flame burn?

<<<<< Watch the video

You will need:

• Bottle of Coke, Diet Coke or Coke Zero (you can try with any soda and any size bottle)

• Mentos (4 mentos per big bottle)

• A space outside

Did you know that the Earth is made of different layers?

Watch this video from Auckland Museum, then draw a diagram in your learning journal that shows Earth's layers. Add labels to your diagram. Make sure that you label:
- the Crust
- the Mantle
- the Outer Core
- the Inner Core

Extra for Experts: Can you add a fact to your diagram about each of the Earth's layers? Listen carefully to the video again and record your favourite fact about each layer.

Have you ever wondered how Auckland ended up with so many different volcanoes?

Watch this video from Auckland Museum and learn about the formation of the many volcanoes that dot our landscape.

Mataoho was the ancestor god who Maori believed brought underground volcanic fires to New Zealand from Hawaiki. In your learning journal, draw a picture of what you think Mataoho would have looked like. Then write some sentences to describe the special powers that you think he would have.

You will need:

Small plastic cups or glasses

Paper towels

Food coloring in primary colors

Water

What to do:

1. Place 7 cups in a row and pour water in the 1st, 3rd, 5th, and 7th cup about 3/4 full.

2. Add 5 drops of red food coloring to the 1st cup and the 7th cup.

3. Add 5 drops of yellow food coloring to the 3rd cup.

4. Add 5 drops of blue food coloring to the 5th cup.

5. Take a half sheet of paper towel and fold it in half lengthwise and in half again lengthwise.

6. Trim off some of the length so that there isn’t too much excess paper towel that will stick up in the air between each cup. This will make the water walk more quickly.

7. Place one half of a rolled paper towel in the 1st cup and place the other half in the cup next to it. Then another paper towel from 2nd cup and into the 3rd cup. This continues until you have placed the last paper towel that drapes over from the 6th cup to the 7th cup.

8. Stare at the cups and watch what starts happening. You should quickly be able to see the colored water begin to crawl up the paper towel.

There are science mysteries all around us. Would you like to know how hand sanitiser kills germs?

Click on the Mysterydoug link above and learn.

Find some boat making materials from around your home. Good materials might include tinfoil, corks, bluetack, paper, plasticine, toothpicks, bottle tops and little Lego people to use as sailors. See if you can use your materials to make a boat, then put it to the test! You could run some water in the bath for your test or even in the kitchen sink. Does your boat float? Can it hold Lego sailors? If your boat sinks, what do you need to change? Think about the shape of boats... why are they shaped that way? How does this help them to float? Draw a picture of your boat and write about it in your learning journal.

Go outside on a sunny day and look for your shadow. Take a friend, or your brother or sister, and draw around their shadow in chalk. What changes do you notice occurring as time passes? What is causing the change? At what time of day do you predict that your shadow will be the tallest? Why? What evidence do you have to prove that your answer is correct? Draw a picture of your findings and write about them in your learning journal.

Carrot tops are one of the easiest plants to grow. They make pretty houseplants for a sunny window and their fern-like leaves are beautiful. Eventually, white lacy flowers will bloom.

You will need

• A carrot top (2-3 cm from stem with some root growth remaining on top)

• Shallow dish

• 10 cotton wool

• Water

• Sunny and protected spot

First, tear up pieces of tissue until they are as a small as you can get them… really small! Then brush a comb through your hair 20 times, and bring it close to the tiny pieces of tissue. If the pieces are small enough they will jump off the table to the comb, thanks to the wonders of static electricity.

Why is this happening? After a plastic comb is pulled through dry hair it becomes charged with static electricity. The charge attracts uncharged objects like small pieces of paper or tissue.

Start this craft by having your kids line up all their favorite toys outside. You can even tell your kids that the toys are having a parade. Finish getting the craft ready by putting a piece of white paper on the ground behind each toy. Then, challenge your kiddos to trace the shadow on the paper before the sun moves.

Click on the picture to follow the instructions of how to build your dream Sprout House ......

Want to explore the world from your room? Check out these virtual fieldtrips of the world's wonders, animals and arts!

• Take a look at the cool webcams of the animals at our local Auckland Zoo

• Try out one of the activities for kids that the Zoo have on the website. There are lots of great activities to download and discover new things about animals

• Choose your favourite animal from the Auckland Zoo. See if you can find out lots of great facts. Check out the Animal links to help you learn new things. Make a poster, draw a picture or be creative and make an animal habitat.

Did you know you can grown an apple tree from seeds? The next time you eat an apple pick the seeds out of the core and save them. Place them on a wet handy towel and place on a windowsill somewhere sunny. If they sprout and grow a little root you can transfer them to some soil.

Use up any small, broken pieces of crayon by making a melted cloud out of them.

• 1. Using scissors, scrape shavings from pieces of broken crayon. Work over a piece of paper.

  2. Use a stick or a clean finger to make the shavings into a cumulus cloud shape.

  3. Place wax/baking paper over the cloud and press a warm iron directly onto it. Don't move the iron, keep it in one place to prevent smudging. A few seconds should be enough. (Newspaper or kitchen towels beneath your artwork will keep the ironing board clean while you do this.)

  4. Remove the wax/baking paper and voila—a melted crayon cloud.

You will need:

• 1 1/2 cups bicarbonate of soda

• 1/2 cup citric acid powder (supermarket)

• 1/2 teaspoon of oil (almond/olive/nut/vegetable oil)

• An essential oil such as peppermint, lavender, orange if you wan to add a smell

• Food colouring if you want to add colour

• Rubber gloves (always best if you are using food colouring)

• Moulds from craft shops or a muffin tray.

• Sieve