It’s not every day school children are up to their arms in blubber, get to take part in an amazing science show, use microscopes to watch live plankton and come face to face with a real scientist!
But that's what on offer this week during National Science and Engineering Week, and the University of Aberdeen's Natural History Centre and Satrosphere Science Centre are uniting with around 200 school children to help celebrate it, with their new joint visit 'Just Add Water'.
The kids will have the chance to dive right into the action with the theme this year being 'water'. With hands-on activities, talks, interactive shows and investigations into the living world of water, the children will get a chance to learn about science while having fun.
Children from four different Aberdeen schools will be going along to the events to join in on the science fun. The schools are Walker Road, Sunnybank, Muirfield and Holy Family and Clerkhill from Peterhead.
The events take place between 10am and 2pm, with the schools visiting both Satrosphere Science Centre and the National History Centre for an hour and a half each during the day and the visits are free. Local bus companies will ferry the classes between the two venues at 12 noon.
At the Natural History Centre the children will get the chance to take part in three 30-minute activities. The activities will give an insight to how the natural world has inspired engineering and technology, for example the pupils will experience how marine mammals use blubber to cope with deep sea conditions. They will do this by immersing their arms in water of only a few degrees and comparing this with how engineers have developed the insulative properties of wet and dry suit materials.
They will also be able to observe live freshwater and marine plankton using microscopes.
At Satrosphere Science Centre the children will take part in a new interactive ' Water' Show and explore science in the world around them with several hands-on interactive science exhibits.
Mandy Tulloch, Development Co-ordinator said "National Science and Engineering Week is a celebration of science and teaching the youngsters about this year's theme water. We're also delighted to be working in partnership with Satrosphere Science Centre to offer further science educational activities to north east schools"
Susan Hogg, Educational Development Officer at Satrosphere Science Centre added: "Science is all around us every day and the younger we can get people involved in it the better. We hope that the events will inspire the children to enjoy and perhaps even consider science as a career in the future. I am sure the children will have a really good time. It's also been a great way to launch our new ' Water' Show, which we hope many more schools in the future will also enjoy."