Spring Camp 2024

Question, explore and experiment your way to a science-packed, wonder-filled spring!

Each day, your future scientists will explore a theme that could take them from the microscopic worlds of chemistry and biology, up through the invisible fields of forces and energy, and out to the astronomical realms of planets and stars. Through jaw-dropping demonstrations and mind-blowing experiments, they will get hands-on in a way that will leave them with a thorough, conceptual understanding and a lifelong love for Science.

Kids will be split into similarly-aged groups that will work their way through the day’s activities at a level best suited for their ability. Some will have their curiosity sparked, others will have it nurtured and fuelled, and everyone will have so much fun, they'll never want to leave!

All kids need to bring is a couple of small, healthy, nut-free snacks and plenty of curiosity!

To sign up, please complete the Camp Booking Form, and we will get back to you with a confirmation shortly.

Please note, Week 2 Morning Session is now full.

February Half-Term Camp 2024

Be a Real-Life Scientist for the Week!

Each day, we cover a new scientific concept typically drawn from the fields of chemistry, physics and engineering, with some biology occasionally sprinkled in there. We introduce this concept through demonstrations and guided experiments to give students some base knowledge of the topic.

We then break for a small snack, after which we set students a challenge that aims to give them a deeper understanding of the day's concept. Whether it is making a chemical reaction more powerful or building a faster jet-propelled car, by giving them the freedom to hypothesise, design tests, manipulate variables and learn from "failures", students get the opportunity to be actual scientists and engineers.

Since we provide everything they will need for this hands-on learning, they will only need to bring a healthy, nut-free snack, some water and heaps of enthusiasm and curiosity.

To sign up, please complete the Camp Booking Form and we will get back to you with a confirmation shortly.

Winter Camp 2023

Each day, we cover a new scientific concept typically drawn from the fields of chemistry, physics and engineering, with some biology occasionally sprinkled in there. We introduce this concept through demonstrations and guided experiments to give students some base knowledge of the topic.

We then break for a small snack, after which we set students a challenge that aims to give them a deeper understanding of the day's concept. Whether it is making a chemical reaction more powerful or building a faster jet-propelled car, by giving them the freedom to hypothesise, design tests, manipulate variables and learn from "failures", students get the opportunity to be actual scientists and engineers.

Since we provide everything they will need for this hands-on learning, they will only need to bring a healthy, nut-free snack, some water and heaps of enthusiasm and curiosity.

To sign up, please complete the Camp Booking Form and we will get back to you with a confirmation shortly.

A Paradigm Shift

As we enter a new decade, this seems as good a time as any to unveil a paradigm shift in the way Curiosity Lab will be delivering its lessons.

Over the past five years, we have devised a curriculum of 100+ hours of lessons filled with science and wonder, and we sincerely believe that we have the best science classes on this planet! So you may be wondering, why change a great thing?

Education in the 21st Century

Well, Education is desperate need of change!

We live in a time when almost all of human knowledge is just a few clicks away and accessible to anyone with an internet connection. The days of visiting libraries, scouring the shelves and combing through weighty tomes for a few lines of relevant information are far behind us. All we need now are the magic phrases, “Hey, Siri.” and “OK, Google.”.

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Now don’t get us wrong. As nerds, the promise of breakneck progress that this unparalleled access brings is exciting! But to illustrate the hidden perils this brings, allow us to turn to food for an uncanny analogy.

Throughout human history, the vast majority of the population faced a dire struggle to meet their daily caloric needs (and far too many still do). However, as a result of the progress, led by the likes Haber and Borlaug, and the ubiquity of “junk” food, we now live in a time when more people are suffering due to the abundance of food, rather than the lack of it.

For many of us in the developed world, the scarcity of information, just like the scarcity of calories, is a thing of the past. In fact, a more troubling issue is that we are drowning in information, and a lot of is unhealthy, misleading or just plain wrong.

Think of those endless social media notifications. And those seemingly credible experts denying climate change. And those YouTubers with compelling arguments for why the Earth is flat. And even those world leaders crying, “Fake News!”.

All junk food for the mind.

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The goal of Education is to equip students with the set of tools they need to deal with the problems they will face in the future, and we can’t think of a generation with a more unique set of problems than this one. The systems that worked for us, can not work for them.

Recall the classrooms of your childhood and compare it to the ones today. Sure, the blackboard is now a SMARTboard and pen and paper is being replaced by computers and iPads. But apart from these superficial changes, has the framework that guides Education really changed?

Education continues to be about how much students know. Time is spent teaching “facts” and then having students memorise and recall it for a standardised test. Isn’t this a disservice in a time when all knowledge is always at our fingertips?

Fixing Education requires a paradigm shift. In the 21st century, the focus of Education must be on how students think by:

  1. Instilling wonder, curiosity and the desire to learn.

  2. Presenting opportunities to experiment and solve problems so that knowledge can be discovered and explored.

  3. Developing the critical-thinking skills (and a healthy scepticism) to look at information and discern “truth” with the application of logic and reason.

The Pillars of Our Approach

Curiosity Lab’s new approach is held up by the two pillars of Constructivism and the Scientific Method. Together, they provide the framework for how we design our lessons for the 21st century.

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Constructivism

Constructivism is a learning theory that suggests that we construct knowledge from our experiences. We interpret and process information using filters, such as prior knowledge, biases and experience and construct our very own meaning.

A cursory reading of this theory suggests an idea that we are already familiar with, that students learn by doing. But the theory also reveals why the traditional method of teaching, stating “facts” to be memorised, is ineffective.

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Learning is interpretive. What is taught, isn’t always what is learnt. No matter how clearly an idea is communicated, our processing filters will ultimately shape the meaning we construct. This is especially a problem for science education, where there is almost always a “right answer”. The laws that govern everyday phenomena aren’t open for interpretation.

Rather than fight this, our classes make Constructivism work for us.

We first identify what a student can realistically learn in a single lesson. This forms the zone of proximal development and it is where lessons operate. The size of this is determined by ability and prior knowledge, and it is always within reach of students and never overwhelming.

Before learning can begin, our teachers lay down a foundation of basic scientific principles and intuitions and a scaffold, on top of which meaning can be constructed. This scaffold is comprised of the best activities, experiments and demonstrations to reveal learning outcomes, as well as the right questions that need to be asked to lead students towards those outcomes. These are critical in ensuring that the right meaning is constructed.

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Our job isn’t to throw facts at them. Our job is to guide them to the very own learning epiphanies. Their eureka moments.

And then we do it all over again, reaching greater heights of understanding.

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The Scientific Method

The Scientific Method is the most powerful tool we have to unravel the mysteries of the universe. And it all starts with curiosity…

  1. Make observations about things that catch your interest and question them.

  2. Drawing from experience and prior knowledge, come up with a “guess”, or what a scientist would call, a hypothesis.

  3. Design a good experiment to test the hypothesis and carry it out to get results.

  4. Reason your way to a conclusion and keep repeating it until you reach a deeper understanding of the world around you.

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This may seem like a simple list of steps, but it is much more than that. It is a mindset that has driven human progress for centuries and our classes make this mindset become second nature to students.

Together, the two pillars of Constructivism and the Scientific Method elevate us from just "amazing science classes" to something truly unique.

Wonder, Explore and Reason

To put this all into practice, our lessons are now divided into three levels and are suitable for specific age ranges.

All lessons follow our constructivist approach but focus on different aspects of the Scientific Method.

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Wonder

To ignite and nurture innate curiosity.

These lessons turn passive spectators of the world to active questioners by exposing them to phenomena that awaken a sense of wonder. Through free-form activities and experiments, students are encouraged to question the world they inhabit relentlessly. This is a quality shared by all great scientists and is the first step in becoming a “lifelong learner”.

For ages 4 & 5.

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Explore

To freely explore phenomena and discover the laws of nature for themselves.

These lessons build on innate curiosity and allow students to follow it wherever it leads. They are largely unstructured to allow continuous and informal experimentation. By developing inductive reasoning, where observations are examined for patterns that can inform a general theory, they will be able to arrive at approximations of the laws of nature and discover the answers to their questions.

For ages 6 to 9.

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Reason

To analyze information, with logic and tests, and discern “truth".

These lessons present theories and principles with no claims to their validity. It falls on the students to prove, or falsify, the claim. This involves:

  • Determining a suitable path of inquiry

  • Designing an appropriate experiment

  • Carrying it out faithfully

  • Analysing data

  • Drawing their own conclusions.

Deductive reasoning, where a general principle is used to make predictions, which are then tested through experiments, plays a major role in these lessons. And students have to learn to contend with differing opinions, counter-intuitive results and their own confirmation bias.

For ages 10 and above.

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But don’t think for a second that we have lost anything that makes us the home of the best science classes on the planet!

The lessons still tell stories through our Modules.

The lessons are still hands-on and filled with real experiments.

The lessons are still packed with “WOW”!

Check out our schedule to find out available times.

Between Two Nerds

a podcast by curiosity lab

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We have created a science podcast for curious minds, where we invite a small human being to sit between two nerds and let their curiosity loose in an unscripted conversation exploring the wonders of science.

Perfect for those drives to school and a great way to turn “screen time” into a learning opportunity.

Between Two Nerds is available on all major podcast apps, Apple Podcasts, Stitcher and Spotify. It will be up on Google Podcasts soon as well within a couple of weeks.

Visit the Between Two Nerds’ page to subscribe on your favorite app.

Subscribe to the video version of the podcast on the Between Two Nerds’ YouTube channel.

Or listen to us on here, right now!

Don’t forget to like, rate, subscribe and spread the word!

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