How many sand grains are on that beach? Too many to count . . but can we work it out?

And now for something completely different - such is the scope of Earthlearningideas. 'How many sand grains are there in a bucket – or on a beach? - planning activities to estimate the number of sand grains in a bucket – or on a beach'.

This activity is a planning exercise to estimate large numbers of very small items.

More Earthlearningideas involving some maths can be found in our Cross Category topics - Maths in ELIs

Make your own soil

Last week, we published 'Make your own bricks'. Today we have, 'Make your own soil; investigating the type and origin of the ingredients of soil'.

This activity can be used in any lesson about the environment, rocks and landscape, agriculture, gardening or investigations out of doors.

Go to ELI Early years for related activities.

Have fun with mud - make your own bricks

Our new ELI this month is an addition to our ELI Early years activities 'Mud, Mud, glorious mud*; make your own bricks'.

This activity involves carefully measuring ingredients to make a pliable mud. The mud is then baked in the sun or in an oven to make bricks. The bricks can then be painted and/or used to make structures.

Related activities can be found in Engineering and Industrial geology in our Earth Materials category, or you can search for our 'Make your own . . .' series.

* from Flanders and Swan ‘The Hippopotamus Song’