BLOG: Little Explorers – Our Wonderful World
Eureka! has created our Little Explorers programme specifically to help families with young children to play together, not just because a trip to Eureka! is always great fun, but because it’s vital to a child’s ability to develop core life skills.
Why is this important? We believe that key skills like confidence, communication, creativity and critical thinking are all crucial to their wellbeing as children and to their success as adults.
Eureka! believes play makes people, and from birth to the age of four children undergo intense neurological growth. As they see, hear, feel, smell and taste the world around them, millions of new connections are forged in their brains each second – exhausting! It is the most rapid period of learning and development a human being will ever experience, and by the end of it, a ‘blueprint’ for the adult they will become has been laid down. Joining in with Little Explorers at Eureka! can add to each child’s blueprint through playful engagements with family, friends and Eureka! Enablers.
Our Little Explorers programme of activities for under 5’s, is now focussing on the theme of: Our Wonderful World.
When we look at the current challenges for our planet, we know we need to have a lot of young people thinking about how we can create the transformations which will secure our nature, habitats and environments into the future, and there’s no better time to start engaging with the leaders of tomorrow than in their very early years.
Our Wonderful World activities have been designed to help children connect with the world around them, playfully introducing our youngest visitors to;
- Learning about our continents and the animals that live on them.
- Becoming a recycling superhero and sorting out our rubbish.
- Working as a honeybee – making a hive and collecting some precious pollen.
- Learning about the creatures of the Arctic and Antarctic while playing with ice. Do penguins and polar bears live together?
Whatever age or stage your early learners are at, our Little Explorers programme provides lots of activities for them to be curious, to be playful, to learn and to have fun!
At Eureka! The National Children’s Museum in Halifax, the Eureka! team have been providing hands on experiences for little ones creating opportunities for the exploration and experimentation of interests, ideas, emotions and social relationships, in other words, Learning through Play, for over 30 years. All this experience has been built into the play opportunities at Eureka! Science + Discovery, and into the activities included in our Little Explorers programme.
For more information on the importance of play a great place to start is the Lego Play Well Report https://www.lego.com/en-us/aboutus/news/2018/august/lego-play-well-report