The Parent's Page!

Children's curiosities serve as a basis for scientific exploration. Your children have the natural tendency to ask questions about the world around them. By encouraging youngsters to investigate, explore and perform simple experiments, they will discover fundamental scientific concepts.

Here are just a few suggestions that the Science Center encourages parents to explore to help spark your child's curiosity in Science:

• Make a habit of helping your child answer those "how does that work?" questions by directing them to a book or reliable Internet source.
• Purchase toys that spark hands-on interest. These can be simple experiment kits or even construction type toys. We often mentally associate these types of toys with boys. Girls love them too!
• Children that are exposed to a variety of activities and places learn more. Visiting museums on a regular basis serves as a great learning experience.
• Family field trips into our natural world are one of the best teaching tools you can offer your child. A walk in the woods, a visit to a beach, a salt marsh, tidepool or the mountains can open your child's eyes up to their environment.
• Children love to collect things! They will collect literally anything. In addition to those treasured "card collections", why not encourage some things like: rocks and minerals, seashore life (no longer alive of course),
• Encourage children to help repair or build things around the house. This develops their awareness to technology and engineering.

*Science Education does not have to be expensive. A visit to the library can provide you with many books that have numerous "kitchen chemistry experiments". You would be surprised how much science your child can learn from simply planting a garden from seeds!

Happy Learning and Experimenting from the Burlington Science Center!