The Arkansas State Fair is back in Little Rock, running October 16 through 25. The barns are a big part of the fun. Organizers expect about 7,000 livestock entries, with goats, lambs, hogs, rabbits and poultry, and they're adding agriculture education stations so visitors can learn about Arkansas's leading industries, including poultry production (KATV, Sept. 17, 2026).
If your kids walk out of the poultry barn full of questions, like how a chick grows inside an egg or why hens turn their eggs, you have a ready-made science unit. You can start this week with a carton of eggs from the grocery store.
What your kids will learn
Grades K–5
- The life cycle of a chicken: egg, embryo, hatchling, chick
- The parts of an egg and what each part does
- What a growing chick needs: warmth, moisture and fresh air
- Counting days, making predictions and keeping an observation journal
Grades 6–12
- Egg structure and function: shell, membranes, air cell, yolk and albumen
- Embryonic development over the roughly 21-day incubation period
- Why temperature and humidity must stay in a narrow range
- Running a controlled investigation, keeping data logs and calculating a hatch rate
This week's activity: the kitchen-table egg lab
Grocery-store eggs aren't fertile, so they won't hatch, but they're perfect for learning how an egg is built. Wash hands with soap after handling raw eggs, and keep the eggs refrigerated until you use them.
- Make predictions. Before cracking anything, ask your kids to draw what they think is inside an egg and label the parts.
- Try the float test. Gently set an egg in a tall glass of water. A very fresh egg lies flat on the bottom. An older egg tilts up or stands on end, because the air cell inside gets bigger as moisture slowly escapes through the shell.
- Look for the air cell. Carefully crack the wide end of a second egg over a clear bowl and peel back a little shell. Under it you'll see a small pocket of air between two thin membranes. A chick uses this air pocket right before it hatches.
- Find the parts. Tip the egg into a clear bowl. Kids find the yolk, the thick and thin albumen (egg white), and the chalazae, the twisted white cords that hold the yolk in the center.
- Feel the shell. Rinse a piece of shell and hold it up to a flashlight. Older students can use a magnifying glass to look for the tiny pores that let air and moisture pass through.
- Compare and record. Kids redraw the egg with what they actually saw and compare it with their first prediction. That's the scientific method in action.
Ready to see the real thing? Our Chicken Egg Hatching Science Kit ($120) turns your kitchen into a hatchery. It includes a 25-egg incubator with automatic egg turning (every 120 minutes by default), a clear lid so kids can watch without opening it, a digital control panel and display, and an external water bottle for topping up humidity without lifting the lid. Grade-level curriculum and worksheets for K–5 or 6–12 walk your family through the full hatch, which takes about three weeks.
A few honest notes before you start. Fertile eggs are not included, so you'll pick them up from a local farm, hatchery or online supplier, and Arkansas has plenty of poultry farms. Hatch rates vary, and figuring out why is part of the science. And chicks need a warm, safe brooder after they hatch, so plan ahead for where your new flock will live, whether that's your own backyard coop or a farm friend who'll give them a home.
Join the growing community
Every kit comes with an invitation to Aardvark's Seed Planting For Little Hands, our private group for families who use our kits. Members share progress photos, ask questions and get help when an experiment doesn't go as planned. Hatch day is a big event, and we'd love to see your Arkansas chicks next to the seedlings and sprouts from young scientists in West Virginia, Arizona and across the country.
From the fair barn to your kitchen table
A trip to the State Fair this week, a grocery-store egg lab at home, and then a real hatch: that's a complete life-science unit your kids will remember long after the fair packs up.
- Chicken Egg Hatching Science Kit – 25-Egg Automatic Incubator – $120 (choose Grades K–5 or 6–12)
