Last weekend I received an email from the great team over @EinsteinInABox1, stating that our science in a box had shipped.  I’m so excited that I’m able to review this new idea and product.  Educating children is vitally important and not just by launching YouTube.

You might wonder what Einstein in a Box even is, so let me briefly summarise what this cool phenomenon is.

Einstein in a Box is full of everything a child needs to learn about science, but even cooler, it encourages children to work hands on doing experiments with science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (aka STEM).  And, it goes one step further as it seriously promotes working together with your child to complete these experiments.

My first box arrived during the week, but I unfortunately had no time to open it due to a busy work schedule.  At home, the tension was building as the kids were getting curious as to what the box was, what it contained and why I wouldn’t let them open it.

So as the 3rd Sunday in Advent came, I presented the box to my oldest daughter.  It was her Advent present and we were going to do science together.

At first she was a little “oh dad!  Do I have to do school work with you?”  It was pretty clear she had other plans, which included playing outside in the snow and preparing her school project.  But, I insisted and we kicked off a few hours of science … or should I say a few hours of fun, science and messiness.

We turned the kitchen dinning table into our science lab and ripped open the box and we were over the moon when we realised that the box contained details and parts for creating rockets.  How cool was that?

• Balloon Rocket
• Paper Rocket
• Foam Rocket

The first 30 minutes of the science lesson was spent investigating the manual that clearly explained the objectives of the kit and also directed us to a section on the Einstein in a Box web site that had a number of very good educational videos.  It wasn’t too obvious where to find these on the site, but we eventually found them.

My daughter and I spoke about the videos we had seen and I wanted her to explain to me what each video covered, to ensure she was understanding it … and paying attention.

To get the most out of our lunar experiments and the science box, we decided to split the science over several days.  Although we really wanted to finish all experiments in one day, it makes much more sense to do it over a few weeks.

We’ll write a few more posts about each of the rockets, so stay tuned. 🙂

The overall verdict of the science kit?

Absolutely brilliant.  The kids loved it and we had loads of fun.  It’s clear that kids have to be a certain age in order to understand and learn from it, and 9 years old seems to be a good age.  The box itself contains simple and very useful tools to build the various rockets and the beauty is that many of the tools are simple household items, so we can refill it easily and continue to do science experiments.

We’ve tried a few “science” boxes in the past, but many of the experiments were one-hit wonders and buying refills was ridiculously expensive and difficult.

My 9-year-old daughter loved the simplicity of the science experiments, and was amazed how cool it could be to do science.  We only did one of the three experiments today, so she can’t wait for experiment #2 and #3.

This is a super product and I can highly recommend subscribing.  The first box shipped 10 December was excellent, so this obviously puts a little pressure on the coming boxes, but I have no doubt the Science in a Box team can pull it off.