Smithsonian science kit exploring the physical world

Smithsonian Science Kits Review

A few years ago Batman went through and gave his grandparents his Christmas list. It consisted of about 10 different science kits to play around with. Most were duds. They were fun for a little bit, but he quickly forgot about them, there was one kit he got that had staying power. Now, I’ll admit the staying power had more to do with the variety of it, The Smithsonian Science Kits he got had staying power, so I thought I’d tell you why he loved the Smithsonian Mega Science Lab, though we never used them in our science lessons.

Smithsonian Science Kit review great hands on science activities

(this post has affiliate links, and this was a Christmas present for my son, so his grandma bought it)

What comes in the Smithsonian Mega Science Lab

It’s been a few years since he put together our Smithsonian Mega Science Lab, BUT it pretty much had everything you needed to complete every project in it, minus liquid components like vinegar or water. That’s a huge deal for me in kits. I hate the kits where you buy them and then discover you’ve essentially bought instructions and no materials.

I gotta admit I don’t really buy science kits because of that frustration, so I haven’t really looked into the best science kits for homeschool, but this one definitely was worth it.

Why he liked the Smithsonian science kits

It had variety. While I looked at it and personally thought, meh we could have put it all together on our own. The truth is, we didn’t do all that stuff, so it was fun to have a kit I didn’t have to put together.

hands on science kit for kids

The first kit he did: the dino dig. This was one of the kits I was meh about because I know how you can put it together, and we’ve done a couple of kits like this before.

That being said, he loved it. He very carefully put on the safety glasses that came with it.

trying a dinosaur science kit
sigh, this came from the camera I had where no matter what I did the pictures were blurry. That was a depressing time.

Safety goggles automatically make any activity cooler.

Smithsonian science kit exploring the physical world

The next activity he dug into was the volcano. We’ve done lots of baking soda and vinegar activities, but they had official paper mache and plaster to make the volcano and paints included so that automatically made it more exciting. He built the entire volcano without my input, so the only picture I have of this is him pouring vinegar into his volcano. Of course, he used it again when we studied Mount St. Helens and how it changed the landscape.

After this, he just started completing activities and not letting me know, so I don’t have any further in-process pictures. He loved the crystal growing, and all of our home attempts have never been successful, so that was a big hit.

I think the paper mache globe is still sitting upstairs in his bedroom, and I occasionally got glimpses of him painting the globe and putting it together.

The eco-dome habitat was brought out occasionally to put insects in but wasn’t overly played with.

The biggest miss for us was the weather station. Our backyard gets strong gusts of wind and just never found a great place to set up the weather station, and it did eventually get set up, but fairly quickly got knocked over.

Our final take on Smithsonian Science Kits

The mega kit was a huge hit, and it let me know the Smithsonian science kits are a decent buy if you see one to pick up. My one caveat for them is you can often put it together on your own at home, so that should weigh into your purchase if you’re of the “I can make it myself” personality.

More science posts for kids


Comments

2 responses to “Smithsonian Science Kits Review”

  1. I agree with you – science kits can be hit or miss. A still has a bunch of kits she never even opened. She got a big Smithsonian weather science kit as a gift, and it was rather disappointing. But, then again, it’s hard to put together a decent weather kit at a reasonable price.

    1. Yeah, the weather kit just never quite worked the way I hoped it would, which is a real shame. I remember being fascinated with mine, but we also had a deck with a railing where we could install it closeby. It was fascinating to watch the “wind measurement” go up and down with the wind, though I have no clue how accurate that thing was (probably not very).

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