Fun Science Activities

After checking out my plants in the balcony, the young girl in my class had a curious question "Aunty, how do the roots know when to absorb water?".  "You mean, how does water get into roots ..right?" asked my daughter walking towards the girl.  "Yes, thats what I don't understand " replied the girl. Listening to their conversation I said "water enters the root hair cells by 'osmosis' and we will do an experiment to understand osmosis today".  And that's how we decided to do an experiment on osmosis.   What is Osmosis? Plants absorb water from the soil by 'osmosis'. Osmosis is the movement of water through a semi permeable membrane. Water moves into plant cells through osmosis by making them turgid or stiff to hold the plants upright. Osmosis is passive transport, meaning it does not require energy to be applied.   We also discussed about how osmosis is helpful for photosynthesis as well. Otherwise the plan

  Last week our class started with discussion about what make up our bodies, plants and all living beings. Kids knew the answer as cells. So, the question was  1. Can we see  these cells with naked eyes?. 2. So, if we have some illness , how does a doctor understand what kind of treatment to be done?. 3.  If the doctor advises for blood test, what do the labs do with the blood sample?. Depending on the type of the blood test, to see these cells,  bacteria etc we need special instrument called ' microscope'.  Microscope Microscopy is the science of investigating small objects and structures using special instrument called 'Microscope'.   The three main different types of microscope are dissection, compound and electron microscope. By using microscopes scientists were able to discover the existence of microorganisms, study the structure of cells, and see the smallest parts of plants, animals, and fungi.