With the changeable weather conditions we’ve had recently I knew we’d need some indoor activities to keep my nine-year old son entertained. I’m all for learning through play and we’ve been having fun over the last week and growing knowledge with Thames and Kosmos Science Kits. We’ve been sent the Prehistoric Sea Dogs and Crystal Geode sets, which are both aimed at children aged 8 years and over.
The great thing about growing knowledge with Thames and Kosmos Science Kits is that you don’t get instant results, patience is required as well as good observation skills.
The Prehistoric Sea Dogs set comes with a bowl, salt sachet, spatula and pipette, sachet of eggs, sachet of food, measuring cup and instruction leaflet.
We’ve used a similar kit before so my son already knew that patience would be key to this experiment as you need to wait a few days for the eggs to start hatching, and then once they have, it takes a few more weeks for them to be a size where you can really see them well without a magnifying glass. The instruction leaflet mentioned that the kit should have contained a magnifying glass which is didn’t, but the photo on the product box didn’t include this item. so I’m not sure whether it really should have been included or not.
You need to be careful with feeding them as they only need a tiny sesame seed size amount of shrimp food every two weeks. It’s also really important to keep their water environment well oxygenated with the pipette provided. if too much algae starts to form then you can use the pipette to remove it from the water. It’s an ongoing project and one that will keep my son entertained for weeks to come. There’s plenty of eggs and food provided and if you look after the shrimps well you will see them reproduce and the cycle will begin again. The instruction leaflet also gives advice on what salt solution to use should you wish to repeat the experiment in future.
The Crystal Geode set was a completely new experiment for us and we had no idea what to expect. The set comes with a mould, 2 sachets of potassium sulphate, 1 bag of red dye, 1 bag of plaster, plastic mould, measuring cup and wooden spatula, as well as an instruction booklet.
There are three stages to this particular kit, you produce the seed crystals, fill the mould and then grow the crystals. The whole procedure takes about four days to complete. So again, some patience is required but my son has loved watching the transformation as the crystals formed.
You will need a preserving jar (we used an empty glass food container) and some sort of plastic storage pot for this experiment. Children learn about keeping safe around hot water, as parents learn that the red dye really does stain fingers (if only temporarily). My son found it hilarious that he managed to avoid getting any of it on him. But that aside, the instructions are easy to follow.
The seed crystals are produced my melting a packet of crystal powder in water being warmed through the glass. Then the solution is allowed to cool. You then use half the plaster powder (I’m not sure why the kit isn’t supplied with either less plaster or more of the other ingredients so you could make another Geode), mix with water and pour into the mould, then add the seed crystals to the wet plaster. We used a spoon to extract the crystals from the water and then my son scattered them over the mould. Leave for 24 hours.
The next day you repeat the process with the second packet of crystal powder but once the crystals have dissolved you add the red dye powder to the jar and then pour the solution into the mould. We had excess solution so that was stored in a plastic container. You then leave the mould for two days to let the crystals form. After one day we noticed that the level of the solution had decreased so we added more for our our excess pot and added the crystals that had formed in the pot.
We left the mould for an extra day and then poured the excess solution into a plastic cup to reveal our fully formed Crystal Geode. My son was really impressed, and it’s now sitting in pride of place in his bedroom.
For £8.99 growing knowledge with Thames and Kosmos Science Kits has been great fun and we’re looking forward at looking at the offer kits in this particular set. These include Amazing Minerals, Bouncing Planets, Crystal Growing, Molecule Beads, Monster Putty and Magic Tricks. You can find out about them all on the Thames and Kosmos website.
disclosure: we were sent the items mentioned in exchange for an honest review
I’ve teamed up with Thames and Kosmos to offer one lucky reader the chance to win a Crystal Geode set worth £8.99. Complete the Gleam form below for your chance to win. Good luck!
Terms and conditions:
(Please note that all entries will be checked against comments for validation).
Only the first step of this form is mandatory, all other steps are optional. Only one entry per person is allowed.
This giveaway is for UK residents only.
Once a winner is randomly picked, I will check if the winner has done what was requested and I will contact them, if they do not reply within one week, the prize will be allocated to another person. The winner’s details will be sent to Playtime PR for Thames and Kosmos, in order that they can arrange delivery. Please allow 28 days for delivery.
The giveaway will close on 15th May 2019 at midnight.
Don’t forget to visit my Giveaways page for more great prizes on offer!
My girls enjoy experiments to do with nature and my boys like to see things fly, move and create sparks, smoke or a bang!
My son loves experimenting with arts and crafts and colours.
My kids love exploding experiments
My grandaughter loves experimenting with cooking ingredients with some surprising outcomes.
My son is very interested in magnets.
My son likes the volcano experiments
They look fun! The children enjoy seeing things grow or expand in water.
anything that makes noise and a mess
Anything that makes a mess ! It’s all fun
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Something that is safe for them to touch and really get involved with!
my son loves mentos and diet coke
Anything that creates a lots of noise and mess!
Any experiments really, the volcano ones makes them laugh though, the last time they did it the ceiling got covered!
My children love making slime, and erupting volcanos with sodium bicarbonate, food colouring and vinegar xx
They love all experiments – especially edible ones
My kids love experiments that involve slime
My boys like any experiment that is in anyway messy!
My kids like the science experiments that create a lots of noise and mess.
My kids love experimenting with different kinds of slime!
Anything messy or noisy! We did lots of experiments during last half term, the absolute favourite (adults and children alike) as a crystal growing experiment, so I know the geode kit would be very, very popular.
Jane Willis
My kids always enjoyed the things that made the most mess, total chaos was the fun thing to do.
My children love making slime and bath bombs
They love making slime
My son love science experiments, their favourite is to see what sinks and what floats
My kids enjoy exploding experiments.
My children like any experiments that are noisy, messy or smelly!
All. As there is an interest in science. Curiosity, and sense of adventure in learning and understanding science.
The grandchildren love anything that gives them an excuse to get outside and make a mess, usually involving lots of water!
Any experiments, all children are naturally curious when younger and that continues if you feed it by doing age appropriate experiments with them
My little one loves making slime! (Commenting as Jacqui Rushton)
My kids enjoy doing science experiments.
Anything science related or messy!
My little grandson likes anything to do with crystals he’s fascinated with them
The children love science experiments and making slime
My grandchildren often get a science lesson from my daughter ( their aunt ). The messier the better! I may have to ban slime. It keeps turning up in the most unexpected places.
Anything that involves mud, bubbles or slime
We love all kinds of science experiments!
My son loves doing the baking soda volcano experiment!
Anything messy!!!
My kids love making mud and grass pies in the holes in the rocks, and we make little exploding volcanoes at home, something they love!!
At the moment we are obsessed with anything that floes in the air! We just got a rocket kit that we are trying out this weekend so I hope it goes well!
my kids love bicarb rockets! x
My daughter loves anything to do with space and star gazing
my daughter loves anything space rrlated and experiments that make lots of mess!
At the moment, anything messy- I’m not sure how much learning gets done, but it’s fun!
My girls like any kind of experiment – they’re always curious about how things work xx
my son loves making volcanos, mentos and coke and bubbles on snow
We love doing colourful science experiments as they are fab for sensory for our little one too x
Anything with slime at the moment for my daughter
mine likes anything that makes a noiise and a mess
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Making slime and gloop and we have recently made a lava mountain
Making slime.
My grandchildren like making things, like slime and their own play-dough
Anything messy really, they enjoyed making slime
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We love egg experiments! We put an egg in vinegar and leave it to soak and the shell comes off leaving it bouncy
love anything messy dino kits ,crystal growing ,
Volcanos. Basically anything messy, but a great time is had with bicarb and vinegar.
Anything bit crazy / with a big reaction
My children love really messy experiments
l could say ‘winding up Nanny the most’ but they like to experiment with anything messy
My girls love any messy experiments! Ugh!
Anything which makes a mess and a noise
My daughter is quite a fan of all sorts of experiments. We are currently awaiting caterpillars to have in our butterfly net to watch their life cycle and over the half term holiday we made our own bath bomb and did volcanic eruptions as well as a slime workshop where we made our own slime!
Anything that bangs or explodes is always a winner with my kids
Anything that goes bang or is very messy always goes down well
my sons love anything that involves mess like the volcanic eruption
My grandson loves anything messy! Making slime, bicarb and vinegar volcanoes….
They love making slime at the moment that is a huge hit!
Creating bubble snakes is a big favourite currently! Also Mentos and cola 🙂
My nieces love anything that makes a mess!
They enjoy anything with a dramatic effect
My son likes anything that is messy or noisy!
Anything that involves slime
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My lot love experiments that they can watch over a few weeks, we particularly liked rearing caterpillars into butterflies we released
My son loves making volcanoes out of bicarb and vinegar
Making slime, making erupting volcanoes, anything that makes a mess
my brother loves making slime
He loves every experiment we’ve ever tried! Filtering colours, floating tissue paper “ghosts”, bicarb rockets…
My youngest enjoys anything noisy and messy!
My son Dalton loves experiments which involve anything that makes a noise, explosion or bang
They like to do experiments using baking soda.
My son loves freezing and melting experiments.
They love anything that whizzes, pops or bangs.
Anything that involves them getting as messy as possible
Messy ones! Love bubble experiments, anything which explodes and arty ones too!
Any exoeriments that foam and bubble.
Any exoeriments which involve foaming and bubbling.
My daughter loves anything to do with liquid/potions (making reactions and as much mess as possible!)
My daughter loves experiments that involves slime
anything to do with slime, noise or/and mess
Experiments that involve water, or anything that can be poured
My kids love to make slime and grow things
Anything messy!
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we had a grow your own crystal kit which they loved
My nephew loves anything involving magnets
magic milk experiment
My children like experiment with making slime and lately how things grow from a seed
electronics and circuit boards
Anything craft related is a huge winner with my daughters we loved creating a volcano and slime of course! and a solar powered car too
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anything needy involving slime
Our experiments are mostly computer / coding based.
Anything that results in a huge mess for me to clear up
Anything that involves an instant reaction as my son has zero patience!
Our favourite one was getting some carnations to drink water with coloured food dye – the white petals of the flower and stalk took up the colour of the dye!
My daughters favourite at the moment is making Bath Bombs!
Any, usually the messier, the better for the boys
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my kids love experiences that look spectacular!
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anything messy like making volcanos and quicksand
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my son loves catching caterpillars and hatching them out
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Science
we enjoy making volcanos and anything messy
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We keep Making Crystals.
Anything that makes a mess!
any thing which gets messy
My daughter loves anything to do with slime, or in particular – glittery slime!
Slime 🙂
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We grew salt crystals which was great fun and love experiments with magnets
Making slime
Experimenting with crafts
We home educate and LOVE experiments of many kinds! Favourites are growing alum crystals at the minute!
My kids love experimenting with making different types of slime.
My daughter recently discovered how sun dial works so she is trying to create one in the garden using her old lightsaber 🙂
My son loved the volcano experiment in school
My daughters like anything creative, when it come to experiments it usually involves making beauty products x