Saige Early Learning acknowledges the Dharawal people as the Traditional Custodians of the lands and waters of Gregory Hills and the Camden region. We pay our deep respect to Elders past, present, and emerging, and honour their enduring connection to Country, culture, and community — and to the rich, living knowledge of the natural world that the Dharawal people have held for thousands of generations on this Country.
Albert Einstein — whose words we keep close at Saige — once said something that feels more like early childhood philosophy than physics:
“Imagination is more important than knowledge. For knowledge is limited, whereas imagination embraces the entire world, stimulating progress, giving birth to evolution.”
A three-year-old pressing their finger into a puddle on the veranda. A four-year-old holding a leaf up to the light and turning it slowly, watching the veins glow. A toddler who has dropped the same pebble into a bucket of water seventeen times and is not bored — not remotely bored — because the splash is different every time and that difference is interesting.
These children are not playing. They are doing science.
At Saige Early Learning in Gregory Hills, our core belief is that every child arrives in the world already equipped with the most important scientific instrument there is: profound, tireless, insatiable curiosity. Our job — and our enormous privilege — is not to install that curiosity, but to nurture it. To give it materials, space, time, company, and the kind of warm, knowledgeable guidance that turns a moment of wonder into a genuine investigation.
May is one of our favourite months for science. The air has changed — cooler, crisper, drier — and with it, the natural world around our Gregory Hills centre offers a whole new set of phenomena for young investigators to notice, question, and explore. Condensation appears on cold surfaces in the morning. Light falls differently through the autumn trees. Shadows are longer. Water behaves differently in cooler air. The world, if you are paying attention, has shifted — and children are always paying attention.
This is May Investigations: our celebration of the scientific method, made joyful, made accessible, and made entirely at the pace of a curious child.
What the Scientific Method Really Looks Like at Three Years Old
The scientific method, as taught in high school textbooks, can seem remote from the world of an early learning centre. Hypotheses. Variables. Data sets. Conclusions. The language is formal; the process looks linear and controlled.
But the scientific method — stripped of its formal language and restored to its essential nature — is simply the most human thing in the world. It is:
- Notice something interesting
- Wonder about it — ask a question
- Make a prediction — what do you think will happen?
- Try it out — investigate, experiment, observe
- Think about what happened — what did you discover?
- Try again, differently — what if we changed something?
Every child who has ever asked “why?” and then gone looking for the answer has followed these steps. Every child who has tested whether ice melts faster in the sun or the shade, or whether a bigger ball rolls further than a smaller one, or whether worms come out when it rains — that child is a scientist.
The NSW Department of Education’s early childhood guidance is clear on this: everyday routines and play experiences are opportune times for learning about STEM. Science is learning about the natural world through observation, listening, and recording. It is not a separate subject for older children — it is the natural mode of inquiry of every curious young person, if we create the conditions for it to flourish.
At Saige, we create those conditions. Not with lab benches and safety goggles, but with open-ended materials, rich questions, unhurried time, and educators who know how to follow a child’s curiosity rather than redirect it.
Why May Is a Perfect Month for Science Investigations
Gregory Hills sits in the foothills of south-west Sydney — a landscape shaped by Dharawal Country, by the seasonal rhythms of the Cumberland Plain and the edges of the Macarthur district. By May, autumn has fully arrived: the humidity of summer is gone, mornings are cool (sometimes cold), and the natural world around our centre is doing interesting things.
For young scientists, May offers a rich palette of phenomena to investigate:
Condensation — on the windows of our rooms on cool mornings, on the outside of a cold water bottle, on the drinking trough in our outdoor space. Where does that water come from? Children who have never thought about water vapour in the air are suddenly confronted with compelling evidence of its existence.
Dew on grass — early morning investigations in our outdoor space, crouching to look at the way each blade of grass holds a tiny sphere of water, noticing how it catches the light, wondering where it goes as the morning warms.
Autumn leaves — Gregory Hills has a mix of deciduous and native plantings, and by May some trees are holding, dropping, or mid-change in their seasonal cycle. The science of leaves — how they change colour, why they fall, what happens to them when they decompose — is a May science provocation that runs from a single observation to a weeks-long investigation, depending on the child.
Shadow science — May’s lower sun angle means shadows are longer and more dramatic than in summer. Shadow tracing, shadow puppetry, and the fundamental physics of light and opaque objects become immediately visible and tangible for young learners during the autumn months.
Air temperature — the simple, physical sensation of the difference between indoor and outdoor temperature in May introduces children to concepts of heat transfer and thermal mass in the most direct, embodied way possible. Their body is the thermometer.
Our May Investigations: Five Science Explorations at Saige
🔬 Investigation One: The Water Detective
The question: Where does the water on the window come from?
On a cool May morning at Saige, the windows of our rooms show condensation. We do not wipe it away immediately. We gather around it. We ask:
“Did someone splash water on the window? No? Then where did it come from?”
Children make predictions — and the predictions are wonderful. Some say it rained inside. Some say the window is crying. Some are genuinely puzzled and want to know. We guide the investigation: we bring a cold glass of water outside and watch condensation form on it within minutes. We bring a room-temperature glass outside and compare.
The concept — that water can be invisible in air and become visible when it touches something cold — is one that children can genuinely grasp through direct experience. We do not need to fully explain the chemistry of condensation to make this a rich scientific investigation. We need the cold glass, the warm morning air, and a group of children who are paying attention.
This maps to: Observation, questioning, prediction, experimentation, comparison — the full cycle of scientific inquiry, in fifteen minutes on the veranda.
🍂 Investigation Two: Leaf Change Detectives
The question: Why do some leaves change colour and fall?
We collect leaves — from deciduous trees in our grounds and immediate neighbourhood — and set up a Leaf Change Investigation Station in our learning space. Children observe, sort, and describe leaves at different stages: green, yellowing, orange, brown, crisp and fallen.
We ask: “What do you think is happening? What changed? Why do you think some leaves fall and others stay?”
We keep a visual documentation wall — a kind of scientific journal that belongs to the whole group — where children add drawings, pressed leaves, and their own words and predictions. We revisit it each week and notice what has changed.
Children in our Kindy program (3–5 years) can begin to engage with the concept of deciduous trees preparing for cooler months — a concept that connects to broader ecological understanding and to the seasonal rhythms of the Country we live on.
This maps to: Observation over time, classification, pattern recognition, documentation — foundational scientific practices that build the habits of mind of a genuine researcher.
💡 Investigation Three: Shadow Experiments
The question: What makes a shadow? Can we change it?
In May, the sun is at a lower angle than at any other time of year in south-west Sydney — which means longer, more dramatic shadows, visible earlier in the morning and persisting later in the afternoon. This is a gift for young shadow scientists.
We begin with body shadows: tracing each other on the ground, noticing that our shadow moves when we move, is longer at certain times and shorter at others. Then we escalate:
- Can you make your shadow bigger? Smaller? (Moving closer to and further from the light source)
- Can you make a shadow without the sun? (Introducing torches as a controllable light source)
- Can two shadows overlap? What happens?
- Can you make a shadow of a transparent object? (Testing clear, translucent, and opaque materials)
Each of these questions is a genuine experiment with a discoverable answer. The NSW Department of Education notes that best STEM practice in early childhood involves “capitalising on children’s natural curiosity and inquiry for planning — the learning is meaningful, relevant and strengthened through intrinsic motivation.” There is nothing more intrinsically motivating to a four-year-old than the question: Can you make your shadow have a hat?
This maps to: Controlled experimentation (changing one variable at a time), prediction, observation, reasoning about cause and effect.
💧 Investigation Four: The Floating and Sinking Lab
The question: What floats? What sinks? Can you make something that floats sink — or make something that sinks float?
Water science is among the most consistently engaging STEM investigations for children of all ages — and at Saige, our outdoor space gives us the room to do it properly, with tubs, buckets, and a range of collected materials from our environment.
May is an ideal month for water science in Gregory Hills: the air is cool enough that extended water play is comfortable and engaging without overheating, and the specific physics of cooler water (denser than warm water, with different surface tension properties) adds an extra layer of observable phenomena.
Gowrie NSW — one of Australia’s leading early childhood education organisations — identifies water play as one of the most under-utilised STEM learning opportunities in early education: “Troughs of water, buckets, cups, and bits and bobs such as pebbles or gumnuts offer so many chances to explore STEM concepts such as gravity, density, solids and liquids, buoyancy and displacement.”
Our floating and sinking lab uses collected natural materials — gumnuts, bark pieces, stones, feathers, leaves — alongside simple craft materials. Children predict, test, record, and then take on the engineering challenge: Can you build a boat from foil that carries the most pebbles before it sinks?
This escalation — from observation to engineering challenge — is the scientific method in its most complete form.
This maps to: Prediction, testing, systematic recording, engineering design, failure analysis, redesign.
🌱 Investigation Five: The Soil Scientists
The question: What is inside soil? Is all soil the same?
The grounds around our centre and the wider Gregory Hills landscape offer several different types of soil — from the clay-heavy red soils characteristic of the Macarthur district to lighter, sandier soils and the dark, organic-rich soil of our garden beds.
We collect small samples from different locations and examine them — first with eyes and fingers, then with magnifying glasses. What can we see? What does it feel like? What is different between this soil and that soil?
We add water to small amounts of each sample and note how they respond. We look at what is growing in each type. We plant fast-germinating seeds in different soil samples and observe over the following weeks which supports growth most readily.
Soil science is quiet, patient, and deeply satisfying — the kind of investigation that rewards careful attention rather than energetic activity, and that builds the observational precision that is one of the most important habits of mind a young scientist can develop.
The Dharawal people have held detailed knowledge of the soils, plants, and ecological systems of this Country for thousands of generations. Our investigation of the soil beneath our feet at Saige is, in a small way, a continuation of the ancient tradition of careful attention to Country.
This maps to: Careful observation, comparative analysis, scientific journaling, longitudinal study, ecological understanding.
The 100 Ways to Play — Science Edition
At Saige Early Learning, our 100 Ways to Play program is grounded in the understanding that play is the most powerful vehicle for learning in the early years. Science investigations are, at their heart, a form of play — the most motivated, curious, self-directed form of play there is.
When a child is genuinely investigating a question they have asked themselves, they are not “doing science class.” They are playing with the most serious and committed attention available to them. They are doing exactly what Fred Rogers described: “Play gives children a chance to practice what they are learning.”
Our 100 Ways to Play encounters in May are intentionally designed to embed scientific thinking into the full breadth of our program:
- Sensory play becomes investigation when we ask: What happens to playdough in the fridge? On the sunny veranda?
- Water play becomes fluid dynamics when we ask: Can you make the water go uphill?
- Block building becomes engineering when we ask: What’s the tallest tower you can build before it falls?
- Art becomes chemistry when we ask: What happens when we mix these two colours? Can you make them separate again?
- Outdoor play becomes ecology when we ask: What lives in this part of the garden? Why do you think they chose here?
Science at Saige is not a scheduled activity on a timetable. It is woven through every way we play.
Extending Science at Home: May Investigations for Gregory Hills Families
The scientific method needs no equipment and no expertise to bring into family life. Here are five simple May investigations for Saige families at home:
- The Window Condensation Challenge — On a cold morning, hand your child a small mirror and have them breathe on it. Watch condensation form. Ask: Where did that water come from? How can we make it disappear? This is the whole water cycle in one breath.
- The Shadow Journal — Take a piece of chalk to the pavement on a sunny May morning and trace your child’s shadow. Come back at lunchtime and trace it again. Come back at 4pm and trace it again. Three outlines, three different lengths. Why do you think they’re different?
- The Kitchen Sorting Lab — Put five items from the kitchen (a grape, a coin, a bottle cap, a wooden spoon, a piece of pasta) next to a bowl of water. Ask your child to predict: float or sink? Then test. This takes five minutes and is absolutely riveting for a preschooler.
- The Nature Collection — On a Gregory Hills walk, each collect five things from the ground: leaves, seed pods, bark, stones, whatever you find. At home, sort them together by colour, size, texture, or a category your child invents. This is classification — one of the fundamental skills of science.
- The Germination Race — Buy two varieties of fast-germinating seeds (cress seeds are ideal: they sprout in 2–3 days). Plant one in a sunny window spot and one in a dark cupboard. Observe and compare over a week. Why do you think one grew better?
The NSW Department of Education’s resources for families provide additional science and STEM family learning cards — linked in our sources below — that offer beautifully accessible, play-based ways to extend your child’s scientific thinking at home throughout every season.
Science Investigations and the EYLF: The Full Framework
Every May Investigation at Saige is grounded in the Early Years Learning Framework V2.0 (EYLF):
Outcome 4 — Confident and Involved Learners: This is where science investigations live most explicitly. The EYLF describes children who “use play to investigate, project and explore ideas” and who “manipulate objects and materials to explore cause and effect.” Every investigation in our May program is a direct expression of this outcome — children hypothesising, testing, reflecting, and revising with genuine intellectual engagement.
Outcome 3 — Strong Sense of Wellbeing: The deep absorption of a genuine investigation — the “flow state” that a child enters when they are entirely consumed by a question — is one of the most restorative, wellbeing-enhancing experiences of childhood. Science is, in this sense, a wellness practice.
Outcome 2 — Connected to Their World: The natural science investigations we undertake in May connect children to the actual Country beneath their feet — to the soils, the water, the weather, and the seasonal rhythms of the Dharawal landscape that Gregory Hills is part of. This is ecological connection, made concrete and personal through investigation.
Outcome 1 — Strong Sense of Identity: A child who discovers something through their own curiosity — who formulates a question, tests a prediction, and finds an answer — is a child who understands themselves as capable, competent, and powerful. “I wondered. I found out.” That is identity-building of the deepest kind.
Outcome 5 — Effective Communicators: Science generates the most motivated, specific, and precise language of any early childhood activity. Children who are investigating are children who need words for what they are observing — and that need is the engine of vocabulary development.
Come and Investigate With Us
At Saige Early Learning, we believe — with Einstein, with Picasso, with Fred Rogers, and with every curious child who has ever pressed a finger into a puddle just to see what happens — that wonder is the beginning of wisdom.
Our May Investigations program is open to every child in our community. We would love to show you our learning spaces, introduce you to our educators, and share with you what curiosity looks like when it is given the time and space to fully unfold.
📍 67-77 Lasso Road, Gregory Hills NSW 2557 📞 (02) 4602 5515 ✉️ enrolments@saigeearlylearning.com.au 🌐 saigeearlylearning.com.au 🕐 Open Monday – Friday, 6:30am – 6:30pm
Sources
The following NSW-based and nationally recognised early childhood sources were used in the research and writing of this blog post. No other early childhood or childcare services have been cited as sources.
- NSW Department of Education — Growing Minds: The Importance of STEM in Early Childhood education.nsw.gov.au — Growing Minds: STEM in Early Childhood — NSW Department of Education feature article by Honorary Associate Professor Marianne Knaus (University of New England, NSW), covering how STEM explorations lay the foundation for lifelong learning, the role of everyday play in science inquiry, and best practice recommendations for embedding STEM into early childhood programs.
- NSW Department of Education — Early Learners Resources (STEM Family Booklet) education.nsw.gov.au — Early Learners Resources — NSW Department of Education’s collection of play-based learning resources for educators and families, including the EYLF Outcome 4 Family Resource Booklet: Science, Technology, Engineering and Maths (STEM), directly supporting science investigation at home and in the centre.
- NSW Department of Education — Resources for Families education.nsw.gov.au — Resources for Families — NSW Department of Education family learning resources, including learning outcome cards and the five-part Learning Every Day in Every Way Through Play podcast series, helping families understand how STEM learning and scientific curiosity develop through everyday play experiences at home.
- NSW Department of Education — Early Childhood Education in NSW education.nsw.gov.au — ECEC in NSW — Overview of the NSW early childhood education and care sector, including the NSW Early Learning Commission (which commenced operation in December 2025), quality frameworks, and the NSW Government’s commitment to quality, play-based learning and STEM capability in the early years.
- Gowrie NSW — The Importance of STEM in Early Childhood Education gowriensw.com.au — The Importance of STEM in Early Childhood Education — Gowrie NSW’s thought leadership resource on STEM in early childhood, including water science, engineering challenges, and inquiry-based STEM experiences, from one of NSW’s most respected early childhood education organisations with over 85 years of experience in the sector.
- NSW Government — Early Childhood Education education.nsw.gov.au — Early Childhood — NSW Government early childhood education portal, including information on the EYLF V2.0, the National Quality Framework, and NSW-specific guidance on play-based learning, scientific inquiry, and STEM integration for children from birth to school age.
- Early Childhood Australia — NSW Branch earlychildhoodaustralia.org.au — NSW Branch — NSW’s peak advocacy body for early childhood education and care, providing research, resources, and professional guidance on STEM in early childhood, the EYLF V2.0, inquiry-based learning, and best practice for science investigations in early learning settings.
- NSW Government — Families and Children nsw.gov.au — Families and Children — NSW Government guidance for families on supporting children’s learning and development, including early literacy and numeracy, STEM exploration at home, and play-based learning approaches that connect centre learning to everyday family experiences.
Saige Early Learning is a child-centred early learning centre in Gregory Hills, NSW, nurturing the natural curiosity and creativity of every child. We offer Nursery (0–24 months), Toddlers (2–3 years) and Kindy (3–5 years) programs, and our all-inclusive fees cover nutritious meals, sunscreen, nappies, wipes and nursery sheets. We are open Monday to Friday, 6:30am to 6:30pm. We acknowledge the Dharawal people as the Traditional Custodians of the Country on which our centre stands. To enquire about enrolment or to book a tour, contact our friendly team today.