Today we’ll provide some projects that you can do to bring more plants and animals to your home. Even if you live in an urban area, you can still do everything listed. Check out the fun activities below.

Rockets and other spaceships are featured in many science fiction books and movies. In these stories, high-powered spaceships are usually able to travel to multiple galaxies without much effort. Unfortunately, we are not able to travel like that in the real world, but rockets are still used a lot for human space flight and other means. We’re going to show you a simple yet fun rocket building activity that’s perfect for anyone who enjoys space. Adult supervision is recommended for this activity. You’ll also find a bonus story-writing activity below that you can use to feature your new rocket.

In this all-ages virtual event, participants will use fossil evidence to study ancient organisms and reconstruct the past environments (ecosystems) where they lived—accompanied by live guidance from our Director of Education! ​ Sunday, August 2 at 2:00 PM, on Facebook Live. Read this post to learn more.

In order to make sense of their surroundings, humans have been making maps for thousands of years. One of the oldest surviving maps of the world is actually a small clay tablet dating back to 700 to 500 BCE called The Babylonian Map of the World. It shows the City of Babylon in the center with the Euphrates River crossing through the city, with the ocean surrounding it.

This week, we’re learning about the water cycle. In a previous post, we explained the different water phases (solid, liquid, gas) as well as the different types of water sources. We also dove into a few of the stages that water goes through in order to keep moving around the planet.

One of the stages was precipitation, or in other words, rain! Today we’re going to show you how to demonstrate your own kind of precipitation by creating a rain cloud in a glass.

Parachutes are important because they create drag on a falling object. All object fall to the ground at the same rate. If a human jumped out of an airplane without a parachute, they would hit the ground at too fast a rate to survive. Parachutes collect the air as the person falls to create more drag and slow the person down as they head towards the ground. In this activity you will make your own parachute and test your design to see if it falls safely to the ground.

Reduce REUSE Recycle!

In honor of the 50th anniversary of Earth Day, this project will practice reusing! The DIY activity uses old egg cartons and repurposes them in a fun and interactive way. Use your paper creation and decorate it however you like. There is no limits to your creativity with this project! Follow the steps below to create your own paper from home. (This project takes a little over a day to do because the paper needs to dry.)

This chemistry experiment uses an acid, vinegar, and, a base, salt, in one bowl to clean copper pennies, and in another bowl, just vinegar to turn a penny green! When dirty pennies are placed in vinegar and salt, the copper oxide on and some of the copper on the penny dissolve in the water and is removed from the pennies surface. When the penny is rinsed off and wiped clean, it looks brand new! When a penny is soaked in just vinegar, it speeds up the process of oxidation and over a few hours the penny will be greener.

I remember as a kid celebrating the Winter Solstice in my 2nd grade class. Leading up to the event, my teacher prepared us by learning the phases of the moon. We drew and colored in the cycles of the moon and learned why the moon looks the way it does throughout the month. While students are learning from home, I thought this fun and yummy activity would be a great addition to the blog to get kids at home interested in the learning the phases of the moon.