Science From Home
Welcome to our Science From Home page! Here you'll find listings of our virtual programs as well as simple science activities to try at home with your family, coloring pages, outdoor activities to explore the nature around you, and more! We are constantly adding and changing the contents of this page, so check back often!
Virtual Lessons
Stay safe while learning and exploring the Academy with your class! Beginning in 2021, we are excited to offer new virtual classroom lessons for school students K-12! Each class is approximately 45 minutes and features live interactions with Academy educators.
Our lessons are developed in correlation with the key components of the Academy of Natural Sciences: water quality, climate science, evolution, and biodiversity and extinction. Each class meets certain PA Academic Standards and Next Generation Science Standards. Each topic has its own teacher’s guide full of supportive curriculum and activities relative to the lesson. These will be available to teachers when registered for a virtual class. Our virtual lessons enhance classroom comprehension and operate as a science curriculum purpose.
We look forward to working with you again and virtually inspiring your students!
Click here to see our virtual offerings and more information.
Educator Resources
The Academy is excited to offer lessons on water, climate, evolution, biodiversity and extinction for students in grades kindergarten through 12. We have included some of our most recent research with video segments in most lesson plans.
Teachers, these lessons can enhance your classroom curriculum with activities and videos that you can share with your students, and all lessons follow Pennsylvania Academic State Standards and Next Generation Science Standards.
Click here to explore our new educator resources.
Reading List: Taking Care of the Environment
You probably care deeply about keeping the environment clean. You likely take steps to be an environmental steward, perhaps rinsing and sorting your recycling, composting, conserving water, reusing items and more. You may even encourage members of your household to do the same. But have you considered how to explain the importance of these actions to your kids, grandkids, nieces, nephews or friends? How will you help to prepare the next generation to work hard to make the planet a more sustainable place?
Whether you’re seeking a starting point for conversation, you want to further your own knowledge or you’re looking to join a global movement, this reading list will help you find a place to start.
Paleopalooza
Explore our October 2020 virtual Paleopalooza festival! Download new dinosaur activities and watch exclusive videos, tune in to talk with real scientists, learn about fossils from all over the world and see specimens from the Academy’s behind-the-scenes collections.
Science From Home Activity Sheets
Click here to explore all of our virtual Paleopalooza activities.
Earth and Water Science Celebration
Practice stewardship of our natural resources with our Earth and Water Science Celebration. Download fun activities and find out how to conserve resources. Watch and learn about city and coastal environments and how they adapt to be greener and better managed. Meet Academy scientists and hear from them about how the world’s water is changing and what we can do to protect it.
Science From Home Activities: Earth and Water Science
Learn about our natural world with these fun, interactive, hands-on activities that are easy to do with basic household materials or simple-to-find supplies. Get crafty and make a recycled magnet or DIY food wraps, learn how to set up your own rainwater collector and more!
New Activities
New activities just added! Grow a gourd, make a bird migration station, learn how to press plants and more!
Bug Fest
All of our 2020 virtual Bug Fest activities are now online!
Talk about web crawling… Bug Fest has gone digital for 2020! Join us on Zoom, Facebook and Instagram to celebrate all things creepy, crawly, sticky, prickly, wiggly, yucky, and kinda cute for our annual celebration of invertebrates. Download new activities and watch exclusive videos; tune in to talk with real scientists; learn about insects from all over the world, and see specimens from the Academy’s behind-the-scenes collections. Go ahead, get caught in our web!
Click here to explore all of our 2020 virtual Bug Fest.
Totally Turtles Weekend
Explore Totally Turtles Weekend, a digital festival celebrating everything turtle, tortoise and terrapin! Discover how this amazing order of hard-shelled survivors lived in the past and thrives in the present. From pizza-loving cartoon ninjas to real-life turtles that call the Academy home, learn all about these “heroes in a half shell” with activities and crafts you can try at home as well as live videos. Turtle power!
Turtle from Home!
Download crafts and activities to try at home.
Explore all of our virtual Totally Turtles Weekend activities.
More New Activities!
Just added! Try these fun, hands-on activities that are easy to do with materials you usually have at home. Show us your at home projects! Message us on Facebook, or find us on Twitter and Instagram at @acadnatsci.
Build Your Own Bird Feeder
You can reuse many household materials to build a cute and useful bird feeder! Check out your recycling bin for a coffee can or milk carton. Then plan out and craft a bird feeder for your outdoor space.
Download our April Kids Club Activity Sheet for complete instructions.
Looking for even more ways to build homemade bird feeders? Click here for six more ideas you can try.
Color a Garden Bed
Gardening, whether in your yard, in pots on your windowsill or in your imagination, is a wonderful way to enjoy nature, especially when we’re stuck at home. On this printable activity sheet for kids, you can exercise your creativity and draw your very own garden bed.
Click here to download.
Home Science Activities
Try these fun, interactive, hands-on activities that are easy to do with materials you usually have at home. Explore with your child and learn together while having fun. We hope you enjoy the activities listed here while you spend time with your child, sharing your knowledge and gaining new experiences as you explore the world of science together.
Happy Science Adventures!
Simple science activities to try at home:
Color Our Collections
Coloring can have many benefits for people of all ages. It can help enhance motor skills and vision, reduce stress and anxiety and improve focus.
Click here to download a PDF coloring book made of images from the Academy's Library and Archives.
Get Outside Nature Hunt
Listen for bird calls, smell a flower and hug a tree to complete this outdoor scavenger hunt!
Click here to download the nature hunt!
Biodiversity Bug Talks
Learn about the biodiversity of bugs and meet some of the insects that live at the Academy with educator David Schloss in these three short videos:
Amblypygid and Vinergaroon
Madagascar Hissing Cockroach
Millipedes and Centipedes
Looking for more? Our Academy Kids Club Activity Sheets have lots of great science ideas you can try at home. Download the sheets below for hours of entertainment for your kids:
What is science, and how can parents help?
Science is the effort to discover and increase human understanding of how the physical and natural world works. It is amazing how science touches every aspect of our daily lives; from turning on the lights in the classroom to the snacks we eat daily. Science is about encouraging and asking questions, it is a process rather than a set of facts to memorize. As members of society, it is important that your child gains understanding of what science is and becomes familiar with the work and activities associated with science.
In all types of science, we use the same tools for investigation. We question, observe, study, experiment, and then discover and uncover new findings. As parents, we can model these activities with our children and, through hands-on activities, build and nurture their sense of curiosity. Young children are natural scientists. It is our role to encourage them to continue in their explorations.
Ten Good Reasons to use Science as a Vehicle for Learning
(via www.sciencestart.com)
- Science responds to children’s need to learn about the world around them.
- Children’s everyday experience is the foundation for science.
- Open-ended science activities involve children at a range of different developmental levels.
- Hands-on science activities permit teachers to observe and respond to children’s individual strengths and needs.
- The scientific approach of “trial and error” welcomes error and interprets it as valuable information, not as failure.
- Science strongly supports the development of language and literacy.
- Science helps children with limited language to participate in the classroom.
- The problem-solving skills of science easily generalize to social situations.
- Science demonstrations help children become comfortable in large group conversations.
- Science connects easily to other areas, including play, art, math, music, movement, and social studies.