Discerning Australian

How do I entertain my kids AND work from home, AND run a household, AND not go crazy?

Now that so many children are isolated at home with their families, it’s getting hard to find ways to achieve entertainment, work and calm. A huge number of sites have appeared with lists and lists of online education resources and things to do. As with many other topics, we have found the lists to be bewildering and overwhelming. So we have started reviewing some for ourselves, so we can bring you some tried and tested links to things you and your kids will hopefully enjoy. We’ll keep bringing you more as we find some really good sites. We are constantly reviewing at the moment.

Space

For primary school kids who are interested in space and space travel, head to NASA for a great range of resources. Have a browse yourself first, there are activities relating to space (including making your own rockets), printable colouring sheets, downloadable pdf books and puzzles.

Animals

There are a growing number of zoos launching live webcams around the world so kids (and families) can watch the animals even if they aren’t able to visit. Earth Cam has a huge variety of options, but are mostly based in the US so many of their cameras are literally dark when Australian kids are awake. Nonetheless, there are some slightly more local cameras and it is an interesting view of the world. Within Australia, our favourite live zoo feed its undoubtedly the Melbourne zoos. They’ve got several views of various animals in both Melbourne and Werribee zoos, and we’ve never had a “failed visit”, there have always been animals to see.

Monterey Bay Aquarium in California has a very impressive website. When it is daytime there, they have live streams of lots of their fish and animals. When they aren’t live streaming, these are replaced by pre-recorded videos of their exhibits. They also have huge amounts of information about their various creatures, and lost of educational resources, games and activities. 

Parks

Google has setup some pretty impressive virtual tours of 5 National Parks in the US. Each is led by a local park ranger, and has a variety of 360 degree cameras, explanations, and some videos. It doesn’t work so well on the phone, these are ones which are best viewed on full screen on the computer or TV. Our favourite was the Hawaiian volcano.

If you’re looking for something a bit closer to home, many of Western Australia’s beautiful parks are virtually trekkable through their collaboration with google street view.

We are working hard to find more excellent resources. Upcoming articles will focus on exercise and physical activity, and a wide range of other popular interests for kids. Stay tuned…..