I have always been a science nut. I have a background in nursing too. I also homeschool my youngest. When I saw this science kit, I was over the moon excited. Needless to say I was just thrilled to be afforded the opportunity to review Evviva Science’s Bacteria Science Kit – Pre-poured Agar Plates and Swabs Science Kit in exchange for an unbiased and honest review. This is amazing. It arrives with a great pamphlet of instructions, 10 cotton swabs, 1 bottle of antibacterial hand gel, 2 transfer pipettes, and 10 pre-poured sterile TS (tryptic soy) nutrient agar plates.

We were so excited to use this kit, the day it came in we got things ready to start our experiments. My son and I went over what we wanted to test, and when we were going to do it. We picked an odd time, but one we could overall adhere to. I also got my labeler ready. I wanted to label each container to ensure accuracy. Then, we of course, read all the directions. You will need an area that is flat, and where you can set these up with a light directly on them for approximately four days. Unopened plates can be stored at room temperature or in the fridge. They cannot be frozen. Once you cut open the seal of the bag, they need to be refrigerated up to 30 days. If you do put them in the fridge, they will need to put out to warm up prior to doing your experiment, so they can reach room temperature. Now it’s time to do your experiments. If you are swabbing dry areas, get the cotton tip damp with water prior to swabbing it. Swab your chosen area. Then you just swab the cotton tip over the agar plate, cover it back up, and turn it upside down. When you swab over the agar, do it gently.  These three photos are when we first swabbed and set our plates out under our light. See how well a labeler defines them. There is no mistaking which agar plate goes with what sample. We swabbed our mouths, the toilet rim, the tub drain, kitchen sink drain, the bottom of the TV, our tap water, both our laptops’ keyboards, and the bathroom sink drain. We were quite pleased to see there was really no growth in our tap water at the end, phew. For the experiments where we needed to get the cotton tip wet, we used bottled water so it wouldn’t interfere with our testing of our tap water.

 This photo is our experiment at 25 hours. We could notice a little growth started. To make sure no family turned the light off, we let everyone know to not to touch. If you need to, leave a note by the lamp that clearly states to never turn it off.

These two photos are at 49 hours. Notice, there is a lot more growth of our wonderful bacteria, lol. We were very excited.

 Here we are at 75 hours. There is a lot more growth noted. We decided to continue on to see how it would grow.

 This is at 99 hours. But, since it was 2.a.m., we didn’t turn off the light until the afternoon.

 At 116 hours, the warming light was officially turned off. We had some trouble with out microscope not working, Murphy’s Law. Fortunately, I have a large, lighted magnifying glass. We were able to see these bacteria quite well. We discovered that every drain swiped pretty much showed the same bacteria. The toilet rim was disgusting , lol. It had great bacteria to look at. I left it dirty for the experiment, and as soon as we had swabbed it, I used my usual toilet cleaner with Clorox to clean it. I was shocked to see my keyboard had more bacteria on it than my son’s. His is always dirty, and I clean mine off, hmmmm. My son just turned 8, and had an absolute blast doing this. He would sit and check on them daily. We would talk about them daily. He was really engaged in a subject he had trouble connecting with prior to this experiment. Kids really do get inspired with hands on experiments. This one is a no brainer to do. It is so simple, anyone can do it. I am highly pleased with the quality and ease of this kit. This has really brought the world of science to my son and that is invaluable.  Here are the individual pictures of the plates at 116 hours:

If you would like to purchase this kit, it can be found here on Amazon: //ws-na.amazon-adsystem.com/widgets/q?ServiceVersion=20070822&OneJS=1&Operation=GetAdHtml&MarketPlace=US&source=ac&ref=tf_til&ad_type=product_link&tracking_id=cspprorevblo-20&marketplace=amazon&region=US&placement=B00W4XHF3G&asins=B00W4XHF3G&linkId=KKNLZPKVTGDXJFJ3&show_border=true&link_opens_in_new_window=true