| We offer over 50 Workshops to choose from. We have grouped them into nine different categories.
Be Tobacco Free: Investigate the consequences of tobacco use with experiments that compare the function of healthy and unhealthy lungs. Make and take home the Be Tobacco Free message in the form of a thick, dark slime that simulates smoker’s phlegm.
Healthy Choices: Learn how making good choices can help us be healthy! We will take a look at the new "My Pyramid" food guide, discover where our food really comes from, and see what part exercise plays in building a strong and healthy body.
Mission Nutrition: Build a nutritional pie chart using life-size food replicas. Conduct hands on experiments to improve your understanding of how bile breaks down fats and watch as we “burn calories” with a simplified calorimeter.
Chemistry Corner
Che-“mystery”: Eliminate the mystery in chemistry! Explore one of the most exciting and fundamental sciences as you see a crazy crystal garden grow in front of you and experiment with Mad Science Magic Mud, a non-Newtonian fluid!
Dry Ice: Explore the 3 states of matter. Turn water into ice in 30 seconds! Have FUN as we create some of the same awesome smoke illusions and special effects used in the movies! You’ve never seen carbon dioxide like this before!
Get Crazy with Chemistry: This class is jammed-packed with the best chemistry has to offer. Watch paper vanish in a flash, participate in the disappearing peanut race, and see a wig head melt before your eyes! Top off the fun by making your own polymer to take home.
Harnessing Heat: Watch an ice cube melt in seconds! Learn how molecules move at different temperatures and how thermometers work. Enjoy a tasty experiment when we use heat and centrifugal force to transform sugar into cotton candy!
Kitchen Chemistry: Children get clued in on the differences between chemical and physical reactions. Discover how yeast and sugar react to produce a gas-filled balloon. Test food samples in search of nutrients, starches and proteins. Dinnertime will never be the same!
Matter of Fact: Explore the three states of matter. Delve into the nuts and bolts of the universe as we explore molecules and how they are held together. Investigate dramatic differences between physical and chemical changes.
Slippery Science: This class demystifies one of the most fascinating and beneficial molecules known to mankind – Polymers! Learn how these giant molecules are made as you make your very own polymer!
Earth, Wind & Waves
Earthworks: Explore the powerful processes that shape our planet and form remarkable rocks, magnificent minerals, and glittering gems! Perform an “earth-shaking” experiment and find out what is on Mother Earth’s plate (plate tectonics that is).
Harness the Wind: Observe the creation of “wind” and discover how it can be harnessed for flight, to power a mill, and luckily for skydivers, to break a fall. Test out our “sail cars” and create a wind wheel to catch a stream of air.
Magnetic Magic: Experience the attractions of magnetism as you investigate the powers and daily uses of magnets. Test for magnetic fields, find out if magnets can float in mid-air, and build the world’s simplest motor.
Mineral Mania: Peek beneath the Earth’s crust and see what it’s made of. Recreate the process of rock formation and devise ways to identify and classify rocks and minerals. Experience the thrill of panning for gems; the gems you find you can take home.
Wacky Water: Children explore this fascinating fluid’s many facets including density, water pollution, and wave motion. Build density stackers and test objects to see if they float, sink, or “flink.”
Walloping Weather: Discover how clouds, tornadoes, and lightening form, and how powerful they can be. Get charged up as you witness a demonstration of indoor lightening, become a meteorologist and make your own “pet” tornado to take home – you’ll be swept away!
Junior Engineers
Electricity: Excite some electrons as you construct some serious circuits (parallel and series, to be specific). Test various materials for conductivity with space age plasma balls. Apply your newly found skills and knowledge to create and play an electronic game.
“Fun”-damental Forces: Gravity…inertia…centripetal force… who could ever imagine that an introduction to physics could be so much fun? We’ll experience these awesome forces for ourselves and build some cool devices to watch them at work!
Mad Science Machines: We’ll check out the simple machines we use everyday. Design, problem-solve, and have a whole lot of fun with pulleys and levers! Use your newly found engineering skills to make your own Mad Science drag-racer.
Measure For Measure: Investigate how your body can be used as a ruler. Experiment with “weighty” issues using balances. Apply your sharpened skills as you look for treasure on a “Measure Hunt.”
Science of Toys: Kids test, play, and ponder of what makes toys work. Spin into action with kinetic tops, find the center of gravity with balance toys, and gear up as we investigate motorized toys. Both classic and novel gadgets are explored.
Super Structures: Discover the strengths of triangles, cylinders, and arches. Learn how combinations of these shapes make for sturdy homes and skyscrapers. Use teamwork to build your own super structures as well as an earthquake-proof building!
Virtual Volume: Examine the incredible world of volume. Test your understanding with our color mixing experiment. Use displacement to find out how much water a foot could hold!
Watts-Up: Learn about electricity, its properties and its role in natural phenomena. Make indoor lightning while conducting hair-raising experiments with our electrostatic generator!
Modern Science
Detective Science: Investigate the fundamentals of forensics and discover how science is used to solve real crimes! The case kicks off with a crime scene investigation. Examine fingerprints, mystery powders, ink samples, and teeth impressions. It’s so much fun, it’s criminal!
Fantastic Fliers: The Wright brothers would be proud as we follow in their footsteps. Discover the fundamental principles of flight as we experiment with different plane designs. Build your very own loop-flying stunt planes to take home.
Lights…Color…Action!: Uncover the hidden components in ordinary light – observe demonstrations that blend colors to produce white light, and others that separate white light into colors. Experiment with prisms and diffraction lenses as you explore the color spectrum of various light sources.
Movie Effects: Movie effects is an exciting introduction to the science involved in the spectacular special effects and technology that are behind motion picture magic. Learn the science application in film making from the acoustics of Foley artist sound effects to the optics of 3-D technology.
Rocket Science: This is your chance to be a rocket scientist and investigate the four forces of flight! Explore the science involved in rocket construction as you build your own Skyblazer II Rocket that you can take home!
Science of Magic: Magic? No…it’s science! This class will leave you astounded, amazed and educated. Natural curiosity leads the way to the ultimate in inquiry-based learning as children as, “How’d they do that?!?” Optical illusions, polymers, mirrors and misdirection are all part of the learning experience.
Nature of Things
Bugs: Learn all about the world’s most abundant animals and their role in the ecosystem. Get a glimpse of the world from the perspective of an insect, delve into the diverse defenses they use to protect themselves, and find out why all bugs are insects, but not all insects are bugs.
Digging for Dinos: Become a junior paleontologist as you enter the world of dinosaurs! We’ll get hands-on as you examine fossils, dig for a dinosaur bones, and create your own fossil cast to keep!
Exploring Ecosystems: How do we fit in? We’ll learn how plants and animals interact to create an ecosystem, and how human behaviors have an impact. Take home a grass head – make sure you give it a good haircut from time to time.
Wiggly Wriggly Worms: Become well acquainted with some squirmy, slimy wiggly, worms! Learn how to act like a worm, then meet and greet a living worm as you discover how these master soil engineers benefit our lives!
Sensory Overload
Optical Illusions: Learn why seeing is not always believing! Children are introduced to concepts of refraction, science of optics, and the biology associated with sight through hands-on experiments and astounding demonstrations.
Sonic Sounds: Explore how sounds are created and transmitted. Hear church bells ring through your fingers and discover other ways household items can be used to create sound effects. You won’t believe your ears!
Tantalizing Taste: Develop a true taste for science! Take an up-close look at your taste buds, discover how much sugar is used in our favorite beverages, and experiment with links between taste and smell.
Space Age
Living in Space: Set out on a mission to investigate life in space! Children will see the special adaptations needed to live in space, learn about mission training techniques, and participate in the construction of a model space station.
Planets & Moons: Explore the farthest reaches of our solar system and create a lunar eclipse in this mad planetary tour! Learn how the planets stack up. Build and take home Kepler’s Cube, a fun and educational 3—D Solar System puzzle!
Space Phenomena: Probe the mysteries of meteors and bounce around satellite light in this phenomenal program on space events! See comets up close as one is formed before your eyes, and take home your very own Catch-a-Comet!
Space Technology: Discover technology designed for outer space! Steer a laser beam through a laser maze, find hidden mountains using the principles of radar technology, and discover everyday objects originally designed for use in space! Take home a Lightning Launcher kit that will fly high in the sky!
Space Travel: Learn what it takes to be a true globetrotter! Race a balloon rocket and design your own car engine as you learn about thrust. See the principles of propulsion at work in a real rocket launch, and build your very own Shuttle Copter to fly to the skies!
Sun & Stars: This stellar program is your ticket to the stars! Watch stardust burn and journey through a soapy galaxy as you investigate the life cycle of stars. Use your Bead Dipper kit to create a 3—dimensional glow-in-the-dark constellation!
Secret Agent Lab
Agent Undercover: Calling all agents, calling all agents! Get into gear with Agent Undercover and learn what it takes to be successful in the spy world. Lots of hands-on experience with tools of the trade including a spy bug!
Crime Lab: Got clues? Analyze clues and get hot on the trail of a culprit with the Crime Lab program. Students will perform pH tests on a variety of liquids and conduct chromatography tests.
Discover Detection: Step into the shoes of a detective -- uncover the science involved in evidence gathering and analysis. Students will create, collect, and analyze evidence and discover what skills are necessary to be a crime scene lab technician.
Fibers, Flames, & Fingerprints: Are detectives really scientists in disguise? Students will hone their powers of observation as they examine properties of various fiber samples and fingerprints.
Funky Forensics: Figure out the science of forensics in this hands-on look at crime scenes. Evidence collection and puzzle making will lead students to understand why forensic scientists like to understand the complete picture before they make decisions.
Sleuths on the Scene: Suspects, schematics, and sleuths - on my! Connect the dots using science to help solve a crime in this hands-on investigation of the science of sleuthing. Students will use simulated blood to test for the characteristics of different blood types.
Spy Academy: Look out 007 - the Mad Science Spy Academy is in session! From edible messages and decoding clues, students will have the opportunity to check out the skills that spies have in this hands-on journey into the world of espionage.
Whodunit?: Want to know who did it? Test your skills and learn how the pros do it through careful observation and techniques to handle evidence properly. Students will examine and chart evidence to reveal the guilty suspect. | 
