Grades 3-5 Learning Labs

Most of us can name our five senses, and what they allow us to do, but did you know that animals have some senses that humans don’t? We’ll discuss behavioral and structural adaptations throughout the life cycles of different organisms and learn about the needs of living things. We will also play a game to demonstrate how adaptations help plants and animals survive in their habitats to create a balanced ecosystem among living and non-living things.

Learn about states of matter, conservation of mass, and physical and chemical changes. We will learn how to identify and classify materials and even test out some Non-Newtonian fluids to see how they defy classification!

You can’t engineer an omelet without breaking a few eggs. Can you figure out the best design solution for a problem? Your students will compare a set of solutions and select the best one for the job, then implement their chosen design plan. Their challenge? Keep an egg safe when it lands on the ground after a 20-foot drop! With limited materials and time, they will need to select and build the best design to accomplish this fun challenge.

This IS the learning lab you seek! Learn about forces and motion and how Newton’s Laws of Motion work in the everyday world. Start with an investigation of the laws and engage in a series of challenges to apply each law. Can you roll a marble down a ramp and hit a target? Can you change its motion? How do scientists and engineers take advantage of the Laws of Motion to make deep space missions possible?

Ever heard of Pangea? We’ll go back in time to learn about the moving plates that have shaped the continents we know today. We’ll learn what happens when plates move against each other, including earthquakes and volcano formation. We’ll see how earthquakes are measured, practice using a seismograph, and engineer earthquake-proof model houses.

Travel with us at the speed of light to view the stars in our planetarium. Explore our sun as it compares to other stars and learn about what we see with each season. Make a sundial to track shadows at home!