Fun, educational gifts for kids?

A wonderful child in my life is having their eighth birthday soon and I'm wondering if you all have gift suggestions. They love learning about nature, building things (Lego creations, robots, forts and towers, etc). Educational DVDs, books, activities are all great fun. They have been home schooled and are ready for things beyond that age.

But please don't limit suggestions by age as I'd love this list to be helpful for people besides me. :)

Thank you!

Thomas Elpel wrote a book called Shanleya's quest that's supposed to teach kids botany concepts. I haven't read it myself, but it might fit the bill here!

A tabletop mushroom growing kit seems like it could be really fun for kids interested in nature. All you have to do is mist them daily and watch as they grow. Obviously, probably cooler still if the kid likes eating mushrooms too.

A pocket knife and a book of outdoors things to do for kids. Sorry I don't have a particular recommendation for the book right now.

I like Heather's suggestion for a mushroom kit.

I also like the idea of seeds or a seed starting kit.

I did this at Christmas as I thought these books would make great Christmas gifts.  I have not read them though I took them mostly from the Book Review Grid:

https://permies.com/t/172223/Children-Books-Infect-Permaculture-Minds

Julia Rothman's books are really cool. She writes about different nature subjects and each page is loaded with drawings. So it's not a book you sit down a read cover to cover but you can randomly flip through and when you see a drawing that catches your eye, you so and read about it. Look her up in Amazon and "look inside" a book and see what I mean.

The book "The Organic Artist for Kids" is really fun. I've gotten it from the library and plan to buy a copy to keep. It goes through different projects and at supplies that you can make on your own from stuff you find outside; for example, making your own paint brushes and paint from things in your backyard.

For Christmas I got one of my daughters two DIY Spa/Beauty books with a coupon to buy the supplies needed to make the projects she wanted the most. She was really excited about that. She's 13 but her 8 yo sister also likes that kind of stuff too.