SCOTLAND Glasgow

Children can find out about school days long ago at the Scotland Street School Museum, March 28, 30 and April 2, 2.30pm, pound;1 (booking essential, tel: 0141 429 1202).

Decorate Easter eggs at St Mungo Museum from 11am, March 29-April 1, no charge, tel: 0141 553 2557.

Drop in on architecture theme workshops at The Burrell Collection, March 29 31, from 1.30pm, tel: 0141 649 7151.

Free printmaking workshops for children aged eight upwards at the Museum of Transport (booking essential, tel: 0141 287 2720).

Free drop-in art workshops on the theme of illusion at the Gallery of Modern Art, March 31 and April 1, 2-4pm, tel: 0141 229 1996.

“The Animal Construction Company”, an intriguing new exhibition for families, has opened at The Hunterian Museum, Glasgow University, as part of the Glasgow 1999 Festival. It contains structures built by birds, spiders, animals and humans, photographs and video comparing human and animal building and some live animals and gives people the chance to test their own building skill. Until August 20 (closed, April 2-5). Free admission. Tel: 0141 330 5434.

WALES Cardiff

Join the Streetwise Science Show at Techniquest and take a stroll through the science of the streets. Discover why street-lights give out an orange light, how road signs and “cats eyes” glow in the dark and explore the science of sunscreen and of neon light. In the Planetarium, visit the new family show, “Mars: the Red Planet”. Tel: 01222 475475.

ENGLAND Brighton and Hove l Children aged eight upwards can enter “Metropolis”

at Brighton Museum and Art Gallery, a cross between modern American architecture and fantasy New York, and help build their own city, March 29 (two sessions), tickets pound;2.50 in advance, tel: 01273 292797.

At Hove Museum, children aged four upwards can make an illuminated animal puppet of a tiger, unicorn, dolphin or phoenix, March 30 (two sessions).

Booth Museum of Natural History will get children to explore different ways of making flowers and creating bouquets, tickets pound;2.50 in advance, tel: 01273 290200 2922777.

At Preston Manor, March 31, children aged four to seven (10am-12pm) and eight plus (1-3pm) can create an ancestral portrait inspired by the Manor’s collection. Tel: 01273 292770.

Bristol

To tie in with its new exhibition, “A Respectable Trade? Bristol and Transatlantic Slavery”, the City Museum and Art Gallery is running African arts and crafts activities, March 30-31. Free. Tel: 0117 922 3571.

Watershed is offering an “EastEnders” work-shop, March 27, 3pm (pound;1.50), as part of its Keeping it Reel series. Executive producer Matthew Robinson and a surprise member of the cast will talk about working on a long running soap opera, tell funny stories and answer questions. Tel: 0117 927 6444.

A whirlpool, the Bermuda Triangle, a diver, curved water and a bucket of water that promises to lift any child or adult off the ground are among the exhibits at the new “Waterwonders” exhibition opening at the Exploratory Science Centre on March 27.

Tel: 0117 907 9000.

Carlisle

It’s carnival time at Tullie House Museum, March 27. People aged 16-plus can join a workshop at 10am on making wildly exotic masks (tickets pound;3.50-pound;9) and then join in a carnival procession. The event ties in with the exhibition, “Tam Joseph - this is history”, running March 27-May 9, which features works reflecting the artist’s feelings about Dominica, his Caribbean homeland. Also, young people aged eight upwards can learn how to decorate and blow Easter eggs, March 30, 1.30-3pm, (tickets pound;1.50-pound;3.50) or work with willow, tissue paper, glue and tape to make their own mythical beast, April 1, 10am-4pm (tickets pound;6-pound;10). Tel: 01228 534664.

Burton upon Trent

“Can you handle it?” asks the Bass Museum’s interactive Time Machine exhi-bition for children, which runs until September 12. Try on period costumes and masks, operate the Time Machine’s control panel and solve giant floor puzzles. Tel: 01283 511000.

Cambridge

The winning entrants of a children’s photo-graphy competition, “A Time and a Place to Read”, are on show at The Cambridge Dark-room Gallery, Gwydir Street, until 16 April. The competition is one of many events of the Cambridgeshire National Year of Reading Project, Telling Tales. Contact Sarah Shaw, tel: 01223 369631. Gallery opening times: Tuesday to Sunday noon-5pm.

Halifax

Eureka! the Museum for Children is inviting visitors to take a seat at the Mad Hatter’s Tea Party and join other popular characters from children’s books, March 27-April 25.

Tel: 01422 330069.

London

Imperial War Museum, SE1 Join in an Easter egg hunt, April 1-11, with children’s TV favourites and related to the exhi-bition, “From the Bomb to the Beatles” (on social and cultural change in the post-war years, 1945-65).

Chocolate mini egg for all participants. There is also a display of Mec-cano model kits made during and after the two World Wars. Tel: 0171 416 5311.

Barbican Arts Centre, EC2 Get those feet tapping at “From the Heart”, a festival of Irish music and arts, until March 28. Highlights include a collaboration between Nobel Prize-winning poet Seamus Heaney and piper Liam O’Flynn. Family workshops will cover Irish traditional dance, ceili, folk tales, creative poetry writing and the first London visit by The Ark, Ireland’s renowned cultural centre for children. Workshops cost pound;2 or pound;5 for three. Tel: 0171 638 8891.

Manchester

“Dinosaurs - big, bold and dangerous!”, at the Museum of Science and Industry until June 27, features models brought to life by animatronics.

Tel: 0161 833 0027.