Summer means picnics! In the park, at the beach, even inside on a rainy day, pack math and science fun in your picnic basket with Howtosmile.org activities. Combine STEM explorations about whatever you like best—food, kites, sand, animals and lots more—to turn a picnic anywhere into a whole new summer learning adventure.
Before your picnic, plan and prep your menu and supplies. Cut up fruit pieces and make fruit kebobs in Here, There and Everywhere to investigate repeating patterns. Extend the activity outdoors, even in the rain, by looking for patterns on plants and animals near your picnic site. Build a cardboard pizza-box oven in advance, then "fire it up" when the Sun is hot to melt delicious treats in Cook Food Using the Sun. What's a picnic without ants? Bring simple ingredients along so picnickers indoors or outdoors can make their own "Ants on a Log" snack, while learning about insect bodies in Going Buggy: Three Body Parts.
No matter what age your picnic goers are, try building sand castles in Sand Castle Saturation to learn more about sand dunes and properties of water. (This activity doesn't require a beach!) If you're outside and the wind picks up, break out the bubble solution and wands in Bubble Sculpting to see what happens when bubbles connect. No wind? No problem. Fly a Paper Bag Kite by running as fast as you can, in the activity presented by Lawrence Hall of Science at the annual White House Easter Egg Roll.
If you want picknickers to take home something special, have them design and make paper Animal Hats, to role play animals they see or can imagine. Help them start Keeping a Field Journal, with drawings and/or writing about animals they observe or learn about during the picnic. And get them to think about after-picnic recycling by connecting them with the culture of native peoples, who depended on the outdoor environment not just for fun but for survival. In Make a Totem Pole, picnic goers can craft clean, recycled materials into their very own or group pieces of art representing them and their families.