Category: Science

Dancing Corn Kernels

Materials:

  • Mason jar
  • Popcorn kernels
  • Water
  • Baking soda
  • Vinegar
  • Spoon
  • Tablespoon
  • Pan (to contain the mess)
  • Food coloring (optional)

Directions:

  1. Put the mason jar inside the pan so any overflow from the jar is contained.
  2. Fill the mason jar about 2/3 full with water.
  3. Add 2 tablespoons of baking soda to the water and stir until the baking soda is dissolved.
  4. Add a handful of popcorn kernels to the mason jar.
  5. Slowly pour about 4 tablespoons of vinegar to the mason jar.  If you add the vinegar too quickly, the combination may just overflow into the pan.  After a little while, the popcorn kernels will start dancing in the jar.  If this doesn’t happen, give the liquid a quick stir.

What’s happening?

The secret to the dancing corn is the reaction between the vinegar and baking soda.  When baking soda (a base) is mixed with the vinegar (an acid), they produce carbon dioxide (a gas)!  The carbon dioxide bubbles lift the corn, but as the bubbles pop, the corn falls back down!

 

Earth Salt Dough Handprint

Materials:

  • 1½ cup flour
  • 1½ cup salt
  • ¾ cup water
  • Measuring cups
  • Mixing bowl
  • Spatula for mixing
  • Rolling pin
  • Circle shape for cutting out a circle shape – We used a mixing bowl.
  • Green paint
  • Blue paint
  • Paintbrush
  • String
  • Straw

Directions:

  1. Mix the flour, salt and water in a mixing bowl.
  2. Roll out the salt dough to about 1 cm thickness.
  3. Cut out a circle shape using a cookie cutter, bowl, etc.  Make sure the circle shape is large enough for your child’s handprint to fit.
  4. Press a handprint in the dough and use a straw to make a hole for string.
  5. Bake at 200 for 3 hours.
  6. After it has cooled, paint with green and blue paint like the Earth.

Hurricane in a Bowl

Materials:

  • Large bowl
  • Water
  • Spoon
  • Food coloring – We used liquid food coloring.

Directions:

  1. Fill the bowl about 3/4 full with water.
  2. Stir the water with a spoon until it is spinning.
  3. Place a drop of food coloring near the center of the bowl as the water continues to spin.
  4. Observe how a hurricane is being created with the eye of the storm in the middle and the bands becoming loose as you look toward the edges of the bowl.

Snowstorm in a Jar

Materials:

Directions:

  1. Fill your mason jar about 3/4 full with baby oil.  We used a 16 ounce jar so we filled it with about 1 1/2 cups of baby oil.
  2. In a small bowl mix about 1 teaspoon of acrylic paint with about 1/2 cup of water.  These measurements do not need to be exact.  You want to create “white water” that will fill the rest of your mason jar.
  3. Add the “white water” mixture to the baby oil in the mason jar.  Allow the mixture to settle to the bottom of the jar.
  4. Add glitter to the mason jar.  You can add as much or as little as you would like.  We added about 1 teaspoon of glitter.  Allow the glitter to settle to the bottom of the jar.
  5. Break the Alka Seltzer tablet in half and drop it into the mason jar.  Watch the snowstorm take place!

Note:  Do NOT tighten the lid on the jar!  Pressure will build up and it could be dangerous.  Leave the lid off completely during the “snowstorm” or gently set on top.

Glowing Volcanoes

Materials:

Directions:

  1. Put the tall glass inside the pan.  Mix the baking soda and fluorescent paint in the glass.
  2. Optional:  Add a squirt of dish soap to the mixture.  This will make the eruption move slower and last longer.
  3. Turn on the black light.
  4. Add vinegar to the glass and watch the eruption!

Fizzing Heart Art

Materials:

  • Heart cut outs from watercolor paper
  • Pan for containing the mess (a 9×13 baking pan works or a disposable pan)
  • Baking soda
  • Vinegar
  • Food coloring
  • Pipettes
  • Cups for holding vinegar (We used juice glasses.)

Instructions:

  1. Mix ¼ cup of vinegar and food coloring and put into cups.
  2. Set up: watercolor heart cut out in pan, cup of baking soda, cup of vinegar and a pipette.
  3. Sprinkle baking soda over the watercolor heart cut out.
  4. Use a pipette to squirt vinegar and food coloring over the heart.  Younger kids can use a spoon to drip vinegar over the heart.
  5. After the kids are done with the project, tip off the excess paint and allow them to dry.

Rain Cloud in a Jar

Materials:

  • Clear glasses
  • Food coloring
  • Shaving cream
  • Small bowl or container for holding 1-2 ounces
  • Water
  • Eye dropper or pipette

Instructions:

  1. Start by filling the small containers with water. The less water you use (so the more concentrated the food coloring), the faster your “rain” will drop. But on the other hand, the more water you use, the more rain you’ll be able to make.
  2. Add different colors of food coloring to each of the small containers. My containers held about 1 ounce of water and I added about 10 drops of food coloring.
  3. Fill a clear glass with water about 2/3 full.
  4. Top it with a generous amount of shaving cream.
  5. Use the eye dropper (or measuring spoon) to drop the different colors of water onto the shaving cream cloud. The closer you squirt to the edges, the faster it will go through the shaving cream and come down as rain.

Note:  You can tell your kids that the water is like the air, and the shaving cream is like the clouds. And as the clouds get saturated with water, they produce rain.

Elephant Toothpaste

Materials:

  • 16 ounce plastic water bottle
  • 1/2 cup hydrogen peroxide (3%)
  • 1 tablespoon dish soap
  • 1 tablespoon dry active yeast
  • 3 tablespoons warm water
  • Pan (for catching overflow)
  • Small bowl (for mixing yeast and water)
  • Spoon
  • Funnel (to help add the yeast and water mixture to the water bottle)
  • Food coloring (optional)

Instructions:

  1. Pour 1/2 cup of hydrogen peroxide into a plastic bottle.
  2. On the table, put a pan.  Inside the pan put the plastic bottle.
  3. In a small bowl, mix the yeast with warm water.  Set aside for about 5 minutes to allow the yeast mixture to become frothy.
  4. While you are waiting for the yeast to become frothy, add dish soap to the bottle and food coloring (optional).
  5. Pour the yeast solution into the plastic bottle and water the “elephant toothpaste” erupt from the bottle.

Bird Feeder

This is a great activity for kids to practice their fine motor skills.  It is also fun for the kids to watch the birds come visit their bird feeder throughout the day.

Materials:

Instructions:

  1. Thread cheerios onto pipe cleaners.  We used two different pipe cleaners but you can use as many as you would like.
  2. Once you have as many Cheerios as you would like on the pipe cleaners, twist them into the shape you would like.  The kids had fun making different shapes such as circles, hearts, squares and triangles.  Link the pipe cleaners together if you would like and twist the ends to secure them closed.
  3. Tie some yarn to the top of the pipe cleaner so it can be hung from a branch outside.

Walking Rainbow

The walking rainbow is a fun experiment for kids to set up and observe. Kids will be able to see the experiment starting almost immediately and then check back every 30 minutes or so to see things moving along.  The walking rainbow experiment demonstrates a few basic scientific concepts – capillary action and color mixing.

Materials:

  • Clear glasses – You will need an odd number of cups.
  • Water
  • Food coloring
  • Paper towels

Instructions:

  1. Line the cups up on a table.  Fill every other cup with water.  Leave about 1 inch at the top.
  2. Add food coloring to the cups with water. Add a different color to each cup.
  3. Fold a piece of paper towel into thirds.  You will need a piece of paper towel for each cup of water you have.
  4. Put one end of the folded paper towel in the colored water and the other end in the empty cup.

What’s happening?
The walking rainbow experiment demonstrates a few basic scientific concepts – capillary action and color mixing.

When the paper towels are rolled up and placed between two jars, they will demonstrate capillary action. Capillary action is how liquid can move up something, rather than follow the usual pull of gravity and pull down. This causes the water to move up the paper towel and into the next jar. Capillary action is how plants pull water from the soil and up into their leaves to keep watered.

Once the paper towels pull color from the base red, blue, and yellow primary color jars, the resulting mixture creates the secondary colors of green, purple, and orange, completing the rainbow.