From the category archives:

Activities

Magic Milk

November 9, 2012 Activities

Do you know how detergent works? If you vaguely remember your senior chemistry, you would know that it is a long molecule, one end is hydrophillic, or water loving, the other is hydrophobic, or water hating. What that means is that one end grabs on to the water molecules, one end grabs on to grease [...]

Shadow puppets

October 5, 2012 Activities

I‘ve had a soft spot for shadow puppets ever since the big girl was a baby and would get hysterical in the car at night. A little torch shining at her feet or the toys dangling over her and she would stop screaming and happily watch the dancing shadows. I was very disappointed to discover [...]

The Collection

September 28, 2012 Activities

Our last place was a children’s paradise – an old hobby farm which had been owned by a collector and had two children growing up. It was absolutely covered in stuff. Garden ornaments, knick knacks, marbles, little glass stars (why?), broken wind chimes, bottles, dog toys, old batteries, you name it, it was buried somewhere [...]

Straw Rockets

September 21, 2012 Activities

Remember these? I was inspired by Kate at Picklebums, but with our own twist. Because we’re not about the art, we’re about the science. So we didn’t make pretty rockets, we compared all sorts of different materials to see which goes the furthest. On second thoughts, maybe we’re not scientists so much as insanely competitive. And [...]

The Witches

September 14, 2012 Activities

I remember doing these as a kid and for some reason I thought they were very complicated, but they turned out to be really simple. Perhaps it’s just that my artistic standards have slipped, the girls were thrilled to have something that looked like a recognisable face rather than being disappointed it wasn’t a perfect [...]

Glittery Leaves

August 31, 2012 Activities

I owe this one to the lovely backpacker who babysat my girls in Ngukurr. They came home with the most fabulous multimedia creations involving paint, rocks, containers and glitter glued leaves. What a great way to explore the veins and patterns on leaves and learn about different plants. First collect your leaves, always a fun [...]

Take 2 marbles, …

August 17, 2012 Activities

Some spoons, boxes, lids and other small bits and pieces. Clear a hallway or space on the floor. Let the kids go, while they make up weird and bizarre rules about where the marbles have to go and how they have to get there. Science? Well, I suppose you could count the gravity weight comparisons [...]

Frozen Candles

August 10, 2012 Activities

A little while ago we made ice lanterns, remember? Something interesting happened with the tea lights, and led to many more happy burning sessions while the girls worked it out. This is one of the candles from the ice lantern, if you have a look you can see that the top still has a thick, [...]

Look Closely

August 2, 2012 Activities

I have light blue eyes, as do my siblings and father. So it’s very obvious looking at us that there is a black spot in the middle. But I had a fun experience one time when I was teaching a class of 13 year olds in an Aboriginal community – they didn’t realise they had [...]

Ice Lanterns

June 21, 2012 Activities

For the southern hemisphere today is the winter solstice, the shortest day of the year. Most of the winter solstice traditions come from the northern hemisphere where it is very dark and snowy, so they often involve candles and bonfires to make light. I wanted to use candles, but I also wanted some way to [...]