Eggs
Activity sheet
Children are born scientists – they love to explore anddiscover. There are many activities that you can enjoy doingat home with your little scientist.
Questions
•Which animals lay eggs?
•Which animal lays the eggs we buy from the shopto eat?
•What is the difference between eggs from the shopto eggs from the farm?
Try This At Home
Spinning Eggs: How can you tell if an eggis cooked or raw?
See a video demonstration of this Science Time activity at
You Will Need
•A raw egg
•A hardboiled egg
•A hard surface to spin the eggs on
•A bottle of frozen water
•A bottle half full of water
What to Do
- Try to work out which egg is the boiled one.
- Can you tell just by holding them or shaking them?Feel and listen.
- Try to spin the eggs on a hard surface. Be careful theydon’t slide off and break on the floor!
- The boiled egg is the one that spins the fastest.
What’s Happening?
The raw egg is liquid inside so when you try tospin it the liquid sloshes around and slows theegg down. The boiled egg is hard inside so itshould spin much faster.
Discover More
Now try to spin the two bottles. The bottle ofice is just like the boiled egg while the bottleof water is like the raw egg - the water sloshingaround inside slows it down so it won’t spinvery well.
Did You Know?
The eggs we eat are laid by female chickenscalled hens. Male chickens are called roosters.The eggs from the shop will never hatch intobaby chickens because they are laid by henswithout any roosters around.
Try These Other Activities
•Bubble egg: Place an egg in a jar. Get an adultto pour hot water over the egg. Wait 5 to 10minutes. Tiny air bubbles will start to appeararound the surface of the egg. Eggs have tinypores (holes) in the shell to allow the animalinside to breathe.
•Egg in a bottle: You need a peeled hard-boiledegg and a glass bottle with an opening about thesame width as the egg. Ask an adult to light apiece of paper on fire and put it inside the bottlethen quickly put the egg on the neck of the bottle.The egg will be pushed into the bottle. As the airinside the bottle is heated it expands, pushingsome air out around the egg. Once the flamegoes out, the air inside the bottle gets coolerand shrinks. The higher pressure air outside thebottle tries to get inside to even out the pressuredifference. The only way to do this is to get theegg out of the way first. The higher pressureoutside the bottle forces the egg inside.
•Try getting a balloon into a jar the same way.The balloon needs to have half a cup of waterinside so the flame doesn’t pop it.
Go on an Excursion
Go on an egg excursion! Here are some suggestionsin the Canberra region.
•NationalDinosaurMuseum atGold Creek and look at pre-historic eggs!
•Look for bird and duck nests in yourlocal park. (Just look, don’t touch!)
Sing Songs
Sing this song with your child. Don’t forget to do theactions if you know them!
Playschool eggs song by Don Spencer
They’re round, all around and they’re
bigger at the bottom.
They’re smaller at the top and we’re glad
we’ve got ‘em;
And they’re egg shaped, ‘cause they’re eggs.
Every bird you ever heard, they lay eggs.
Read Books
Have fun finding more books at your local library,
book store or online book shop.•
•The Ugly Ducklingby Hans Christian Andersen
•Big Red Hen and the Little Lost Eggby Margaret Wild
•Whose Egg?by Jeannette Rowe
Investigate Websites
There are also many websites for children about eggs. We suggest you start with:
•Questacon Watch the Science Time Eggs videoat
•Australian Poultry Industry
Open 9 am to 5 pm every day.
Closed Christmas Day.
Admission fees apply.
King Edward Terrace, Canberra
t 02 6270 2800