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Little Scientists is thrilled to announce the state, territory, and national winners of the 4th Little Scientists Early STEM Education Awards. These biennial awards are Australia’s only awards to celebrate an outstanding commitment to early STEM education and invite nominations from early learning services and early primary classrooms as well as individual childhood educators and teachers.

Little Scientists gives special thanks to our esteemed independent judging panel:

▪️ Dr Kate Highfield, Associate Professor and Academic Lead, Early Childhood Education, University of Canberra
▪️ Margaret Shepherd, President Australian Science Teachers Association
▪️ Luke Atchison, Assistant Director, STEM Team, Australian Government Department of Education
▪️ BJ Anyos, Early Learning Coordinator, Questacon
▪️ Himal Randeniya, Founder of LoveHeart AI

Excellence in Early STEM Education Award

In nominating for the Excellence in Early STEM Education Award, early learning services and early primary classrooms submitted an inquiry-based STEM project co-developed with their children aged 0-8 years. Each project was assessed by the judges on originality, STEM content, alignment to the inquiry cycle, qualities as a project, child-led focus, and the application of a gender lens. The quality of project nominations received in 2024 was exceptional.

Winner

National

Bagdad Education and Care, Tasmania

Bagdad Education and Care has been awarded as the National Winner for their project “Will the ropes break under our weight?“. This involved the children experimenting with ropes, physics, and motion over many months to develop and test hypotheses around the properties of ropes and how to strengthen them. For example, the children experimented with lifting milk crates off the ground by tying them to a rope and extending this over a tree. Others explored how to tow their friends by pulling on ropes attached to their bikes. The judges recognised this as a stand-out project, particularly for its best practice and age-appropriate approach to STEM learning and its strong child-led focus.

Winner

NSW

Spotted Frog Kindergarten, Lake Haven

Spotted Frog Kindergarten has won for their project “The Mighty Mathematicians” sparked by the children’s concern when fruit kept disappearing from their play shop. To solve this, they experimented with maths strategies, such as counting, classifying, and tallies to keep track of their toys. They extended upon this by tallying their own emotions, the colours of passing cars, and getting their families involved too.

Winner

NSW

Bambinis Childcare Centre, Centennial Park

Bambini’s Childcare Centre Centennial Park has won for their project “Do bees have homes & what do they do inside?“, which involved the children designing prototype beehives out of recycled parts and experimenting with bubble wrap, paper, cardboard, dough, and even different types of glue. Their investigations saw them liaise with flower experts and share their new knowledge with residents at an aged care home.

Winner

QLD

Seedlings & Co Early Learning Centre, Calamvale

Seedlings & Co Early Learning Centre Calamvale has won for their project “What makes an airplane fly?” sparked by the children’s fascination with airplanes flying overhead on their visits to their eldery friends at Brig-O-Doon Aged Care. It involved children constructing paper planes and evaluating their flight in slow-motion playback to explore concepts like thrust, air pressure, wind, and speed. They also visited Archerfield Airport to sit in the pilot seat of a real plane!

Winner

Kozy Kids Childcare, Glenside

Kozy Kids Childcare has won for their project “How to build a rocket big enough for us all?“, which involved the children experimenting with recycled objects, design principles, and prototypes to build the strongest rocket. They explored different shapes, materials, and sizes for an ideal rocket and explored the answers to their own questions like “What do astronauts eat?” and “How high can we build and still feel safe in our rocket?”

Winner

Moerlina School, Mount Claremont

Moerlina School has won for their project “What is Parkour?“, in which the children built an obstacle course inspired by ballet and parkour. They learnt about how various objects push, pull, and move and tested hypotheses about how bigger and smaller children would perform in the course. The children even incorporated artistic dance and movements to complete their obstacle course!

Winner

VIC

Froebel Early Learning Centre, Carlton

Froebel Carlton Early Learning Centre has won for their project “Blue! It sounds blue!“, which involved toddler-aged children exploring the ocean and sea creatures through concepts like acoustics, optics, and water. They also visited St Kilda Beach, where the children engaged in sensory play with sea shells, listened to ocean sounds, and explored blue and green colour palettes.

Winner

ACT

Winyu Early Childhood Service, Gungahlin

Winyu Early Childhood Service has won for their project “Light Explorers”, which was inspired by the Winter Solstice. The children embarked on a series of experiments to better understand how light affects their daily lives, like filtering colour to separate light, using mirrors and torches to create different shadows, and investigating glow-in-the-dark solutions.

Outstanding Early STEM Education Leader Award

In nominating for the Outstanding STEM Education Leader Award, early childhood educators and teachers showcased their work driving excellence in early STEM education and supporting their educator teams to embed high-quality STEM teaching into their setting. The judges assessed the nominees on their leadership, work to strengthen parental understanding of early STEM, meaningful engagement of the community, and their ability to apply a gender lens to their early STEM teaching.