The Science and Industry Museum has hatched a plan to keep families entertained this Easter through an eggs-ploration of its extensive online collection.

Over the Easter weekend, the museum will be sharing its most interesting egg-related objects and asking people at home to hunt through its digital resources to uncover their own. One of the more eggs-traordinary items in the museum’s possession is an original egg from the 1979 science-fiction film, Alien. Fun facts about the object, the movie and the museum’s wider collection can be discovered on the Science and Industry Museum’s blog.

The museum’s Easter activity is the latest eggs-ample of how its collection, and the inspirational stories it tells, remain open to everyone online while its doors are temporarily closed in response to the coronavirus outbreak. As part of the Science Museum Group, the world’s leading group of science museums, it has over 325,000 objects in its extensive online collection that can all be explored from home.

Through its Objects and Stories pages, 250 years of innovations and ideas that began in Manchester and went on to change the world can also be discovered, including the stories of scientists, John Dalton and James Joule, who both had strong links to the city.

Some of the Science and Industry Museum’s best-loved objects and spaces are also continuing to ignite curiosity online. Take a tour of the Textiles Gallery, which houses original working machinery from Manchester’s cotton mills, or get up close to one of the earliest Rolls-Royce motorcars and find out how Britain’s most prestigious motoring brand started life in Manchester. Visitors to the website can also meet Baby, the first computer to store and run a program, which was built at the University of Manchester, or find out about the history of the museum’s iconic Power Hall, one of the most beloved industrial heritage galleries in the country.

As well as exclusive insights into its collection, the Science and Industry Museum’s online resources offer a wealth of learning tools to help whole families get creative from home. In celebration of the 59th anniversary of the first crewed spaceflight on 12 April, it has shared resources on making things fly and creating rocket mice from materials found around the house.

Highlights from the Science Museum Group collection

For advice on getting the most out of the online collection from home, please visit this blog.

Explore:

The Science and Industry Museum’s Objects and Stories pages and blog are packed with interesting things to explore and you can discover over 325,000 historic objects, photographs and archive materials, from typewriters and trains to magic lantern slides, orreries, surgical tools and even retro videogame cassettes, in the Science Museum Group online collection.

Listen:

Tune into the Science Museum Soundcloud archives to hear from some of the greatest minds in science, including a talk on AI and music chaired by Pulp frontman, Jarvis Cocker.  

Watch:

Head to YouTube to watch astronaut Tim Peake talk at the Manchester Science Festival about life in space and hear Buzz Aldrin speaking at the Science Museum about walking on the Moon.

You'll also find a lecture by Professor Stephen Hawking and a conversation between will.i.am and Bill Gates about breakthroughs in science.

You can also be led on a guided tour of the Science and Industry Museum’s Textiles Gallery by curator, Katie Belshaw.

Do:

For resources from the five museums in the Science Museum Group, including activities and videos that can help with home-schooling, visit our dedicated learning resources website.

The learning resources website also hosts a range of fun games, including Total Darkness, where children can put their science skills to the test to restore power to their virtual town.