Science for kids starts long before school: every time a small child drops a spoon in the bath or watches an ice cube disappear, they are doing science. This page turns those moments into short, playful experiments. Mishu the mouse, our scientist, asks a question, your child makes a guess, and then everyone watches what really happens. Every line is spoken in clear audio in Hindi and English, so your child can play before they can read.
What your child learns from these simple science experiments
At ages 3 to 6, science is not about facts to memorise. It is about a way of thinking: wonder, guess, try, look carefully and talk about it. Early learning frameworks in India (the NCF for the Foundational Stage) and abroad all describe the same skills. The seven games here practise them with things children already know.
| Game | What happens | The science idea |
|---|---|---|
| Float or sink | Guess 👍 float or 👎 sink, then drop the object into the water tank | Some things are light for their size and float; some are heavy for their size and sink |
| Day and night | Is the sun, the moon, the owl or the rooster a day thing or a night thing? | The sky and animals change between day and night |
| Living or not | Sort a dog, a tree, a teddy bear, a stone | Living things eat, breathe and grow |
| Magnet | Guess, then watch the magnet pull an iron spoon but not an eraser | Magnets pull things made of iron |
| Melting | Tap the sun to warm ice, chocolate and butter, step by step | Heat changes solids into liquids |
| Five senses | Which body part helps us see, hear, smell, taste and feel? | We learn about the world through our senses |
| Rain | Tap through four pictures: sun, clouds, rain, river | The water cycle goes round and round |
Science for 3, 4 and 5 year olds
- Age 3-4 (nursery): naming what they see ("it went down!"), sorting by one idea (day or night), and enjoying surprises. Keep sessions to two or three objects.
- Age 4-5 (LKG): making a guess before trying, living and non-living things, and simple cause and effect ("the sun made it melt").
- Age 5-6 (UKG and class 1): explaining a result in their own words, talking about magnetic and non-magnetic objects, and telling the water cycle in order.
How to play the science games for kids
Choose a game from the tabs at the top. In Float or sink and Magnet, Mishu asks a question such as "Will the stone float?". Your child taps a big button to guess, Mishu says "Let's find out!", and the experiment runs on screen. Every guess is accepted. If the guess matches, Mishu says "You guessed it!". If it does not, Mishu says "Surprise! Scientists get surprised too", because a surprise is how scientists learn. A ▶ Next button waits until your child is ready.
In Day and night, Living or not and Five senses there is an answer to find. The games never say "wrong". After a wrong tap your child hears a gentle hint, then the right button glows, then a finger points to it. Melting moves one step each time your child taps the sun. Rain moves through the water cycle one picture at a time, and a button takes you to dressing for the weather.
Tap Mishu at any time to hear the last sentence again. Each game ends with a marble in the Goli Jar and a small mission to try at home. The अ+A button in the header sets Hindi first, English first or one language only. Settings, behind a grown-up check, set your child's age, which changes how many rounds there are, plus calm motion and calm sound.
Easy science experiments for kids at home
The screen game is the warm-up. The real learning happens when your child tries the same experiment with their own hands. All of these use things from an Indian kitchen and take 5 to 10 minutes.
Float and sink experiment
Fill a steel bowl or a bucket with water. Collect five things: a steel spoon, a small stone, a plastic bottle cap, a leaf and a lemon. Hold up each one and ask, "Float or sink?" Let your child drop it in. Put the floaters on one plate and the sinkers on another. Then try a surprise: a lemon floats, and a lemon peeled of its skin usually sinks. Do not explain density; just say "it is light for its size" or "heavy for its size", the same words Mishu uses.
Magnet experiment
A fridge magnet works well. Walk around the house together and test a steel almirah, a wooden spoon, a key, a plastic toy, an iron nail and a paper. Your child will find that the magnet sticks to many metal things but not to all of them: a steel almirah is usually magnetic, but some steel spoons and most brass keys are not. That is a wonderful discovery. Magnets pull iron, and only some metals have enough iron in them.
Safety: keep small magnets away from babies and toddlers. Swallowed magnets are dangerous. Use one large fridge magnet and put it away after play.
Melting experiment
On a sunny day, put an ice cube, a small piece of chocolate and a spoon of butter on three plates in the sun, or on a window sill. Check every five minutes and ask "What changed?" Then put the melted chocolate in the fridge and look again the next morning: it is hard again. Children love learning that melting can go backwards.
Day and night activity
In a dark room, shine a torch (the sun) on a ball (the Earth) and put a sticker on the ball for your home. Slowly turn the ball. When the sticker faces the torch it is day; when it turns away it is night. This simple model is enough for a 5 or 6 year old and makes the solar system for kids much easier later.
Living things walk
On a walk in the park, play "Living or not?" with everything you pass: a dog, a bench, a tree, a car, an ant, a stone. Ask "Does it eat? Does it grow?" This connects well with parts of a plant and caring for the environment.
The water cycle for kids, in four steps
The Rain game tells the water cycle in four short sentences that a preschooler can repeat: the sun heats the water in the sea; the warm water goes up into the sky and makes clouds; the clouds get heavy and rain falls; the rain flows into rivers, and the rivers go back to the sea. Say it with actions: hands up for rising water, fluttering fingers for rain. During the monsoon, point to real clouds and puddles and ask your child which step they see. The seasons and weather page adds the words for sunny, rainy and cloudy days.
How to talk like a scientist with your child
- Ask before you tell. "What do you think will happen?" is more powerful than any explanation.
- Welcome wrong guesses. Say "Oh, a surprise! What did we learn?" Never "No, that's wrong."
- Praise effort, not being clever. "You looked so carefully" builds a child who keeps trying.
- Use both languages. तैरना (float), डूबना (sink), पिघलना (melt), चुंबक (magnet), सजीव (living) and निर्जीव (non-living) are good science words for bilingual homes.
- Keep it short. One experiment a day is plenty.
Screen time, calm play and every kind of learner
Play the science games together when you can, and keep each session to 10 or 15 minutes. For children under 2, a bowl of water and real objects with a grown-up are far better than any screen. If your child gets upset by surprises, turn on calm motion in Settings and let them hold the real object first. For children with speech delay or autism, the big two-button choices and spoken lines let them answer by pointing, and you can repeat any line by tapping Mishu. If you have concerns about your child's development, talk to your paediatrician.
Next, try the five senses for kids page, where Mishu asks which body part helps us see, hear, smell, taste and touch.
