Students can experience a range of hands-on, interactive science activities during their visit to the festival:

• Get their hands dirty doing Soil Science, exploring the different physical, chemical and biological properties that make healthy soils so important.
• Dig for bones in Palaeontology, and piece together real bones to work out the mystery animal.
• Work out just how big dinosaurs really were in our new High School Palaeontology activity, Weighing Giants.
• Wrap their minds around geological time in Rocking the Age of Earth, a geological timeline workshop with real fossils, meteorites, and dinosaur casts! (Friday only)

On both the Friday and Saturday, there will also be a Scavenger Hunt, and Guess the Weight of the Meteorite, open to all – and yes, prizes can be won! The students can even bring any rocks and fossils to be identified by UNE Geologists and Palaeontologists, who will be joining us at our public marquee for both days. We encourage lots of exploration and asking questions at Minerama this year!

Workshops will be held on Friday 8th March, will run for one hour, and can accommodate groups of up to 30 students. There will be a small cost of $4 per student for workshops.

We will be offering four activities for the Friday sessions:

• The Science of Soils
• Palaeontology Puzzles (primary only)
• Weighing Giants (Secondary only)
• Rocking the Age of Earth

Available timeslots are:

• 9:30-10:30am
• 10:45-11:45am
• 1:30-2:30pm

For more information on these activities, please see the attached document. Workshop places are limited and bookings are essential, so get in quick!

On Saturday 9th March, we will offer walk-in, interactive experiences in Soil Science, Palaeontology and Weighing Giants in our pavilion, along with the Scavenger Hunt, the opportunity to pick the brains of UNE Geologists and Palaeontologists, and displays from the UNE Natural History Museum!