Fun Science in Reception (4-5 years old)

Children are naturally curious about the world and want to find out as much as they can. They want to know what makes the wind blow, how trees grow, why fish have fins, and where turtles go in the winter. But they don’t want adults to give them the answers. They want to be the discoverers, the experimenters, and the theory builders.

They don’t want science to be something that is imparted to them; they want it to be something that they do. They want to be scientists; not just consumers of science. They want to ask their own questions, collect their own data, and arrive at new and wonderful ideas. These “wants” should shape the foundation of an early childhood science curriculum.

I noticed their interest in our science classes, when they were more than curious to use magnifying glass, to observe natural phenomenon that are happening in the nature, to take part at experiments and to find more about the world around them.

Our purpose is for the children to discover ‘wonderful ideas’, to be able to answer to questions in order to develop their scientific thinking: ‘What is it doing?’, ‘How many/much/heavy?’, ‘What if…’, ‘Why do you think..?’ etc.

Productive Questions to Foster Scientific Thinking

Type of Question	Purpose/Examples	Examples
Attention-focusing	Calls attention to significant details	What is it doing? How does it feel?
Measuring & counting	Generates more precise information	How many? How much? How heavy?
Comparison	Fosters analysis and classification	How are they alike? How different?
Action	Encourages exploration of properties and events; also encourages predictions	What if…?
Problem-posing	Supports planning & trying solutions to problems	How could we…?
Reasoning	Encourages reflection on experiences & construction of new ideas	Why do you think? Can you explain that?

Children are viewed as “intellectual explorers” (Lind, 1999) and “theory builders” (Chaille & Britain, 2003).This approach assumes that as they interact with the world around them, young children develop their own complex and varying theories about this world.

Performing a simple science experiment, making predictions and observations, understanding the parts of a plant, learning how water moves through a plant, drawing simple conclusions from observation and noticing changes in appearance.

Science activities can teach children to form their own opinion, rather than taking those of others for granted.

It helps children to think about what could happen before they do it, to create a simple hypothesis in their mind.

Then, the children can learn that not everything works from the first time. Some experiments fall in a heap and you have to find out what went wrong, and try again.

Science in school also teaches children about the way the world works eg, how clothes are made or why volcanoes erupt.

It can spark ideas in children's minds that they, too, may one day be capable of creating solutions to big problems!