I always see a lot of really awesome educational ideas on pinterest, but I hardly ever get around to doing any of it. So, I’ve decided that once a month I’m going to try some of them, and write about my experiences with them here. On to this month’s Best of Pinterest!
Color Changing Carnations- Science Experiment
If your kids liked this experiment, check out THIS half colored, half normal flower experiment on the Spangler Science web page. —->
This experiment is one that I’ve seen all over pinterest. You take Ivory Soap and put it in the microwave. Then, it swells up into something that resembles a cloud. What’s so special about Ivory Soap? The air content. The story goes like this:
A man who worked making mixing ivory soap went to lunch and left the mixing machine running too long. When he returned, the mixture was full of air, think whipped. He decided not to throw it away, but sold it instead. Everyone loved it because the extra air made the soap float!
It’s that same extra air that makes are amazing soap explosion possible.
Steve Spangler Science has a video that explains exactly how and why this experiment works. Here it is. If you don’t want to watch the video, you can just check out this link.
Afterwards, we tried to make cookie cutter soaps by mixing in water and food coloring. The lady on the pinterest link made it look so easy. She said it was just like making pie crusts. (I can’t make pie crusts, so I should have planned on failing miserably.) First I added too much water, and everything was way too sticky. Then, I added too more soap, and everything was too dry. It was a disaster. The kids couldn’t put them in the cookie cutters without destroying it. So, after making 2 not so cute star shapes, we just rolled the rest into balls. The kids actually like using the ball soaps better.
Here is a photo of the star soaps I tried to make. When my kids tried to use them, they pretty much just fell apart. It was sad. Most of the ball soaps are missing from this picture. The kids keep stealing them and running to the bathroom to wash their hands. It’s crazy how they actually WANT to wash their hands all the time.
This was SmartyPants’ favorite. I think the kids did it three times each. First we watched this video. Yes, it was a little over their heads, but I think SmartyPants got the gist of it. He at least knew that it was a chemical reaction.
Then, we poured a little bit of milk into bowls and added food coloring. I got some q-tips and put them in a small bowl of Dawn dish soap. (I don’t know if the brand matters, but I’ve heard that all natural soaps do not work as well.) Then, I let the children touch the middle of the milk with one of the q-tips. All the color raced towards the edge of the bowl. They loved it! I loved it, too.
This pintrest post was a collection of three addition worksheets featuring dominoes. SmartyPants loves dominoes and math, but usually dislikes math worksheets. (Probably because he doesn’t like writing.) So, he loved the first worksheet. He had a lot of fun finding the correct dominoes and “parking” them. I had to help him with the 11 and 12 parking spot. We usually just do addition up to 10. Besides, there was only one domino for each of those places, and a lot of wrong dominoes to wade through before they were found.
The second worksheet was still considered fun. He did it with no complaining. It was great addition practice. (We’re still working on writing the number 3 the right way.)
The third worksheet was too much for him. He complained about how hard it was, how he didn’t want to draw the dots or write numbers anymore. We didn’t end up finishing it anymore. I don’t make him do anything he isn’t excited about. SmartyPants is only four, and way ahead. I don’t want to force him to do things he doesn’t enjoy. Then he might not love learning and doing “school” anymore.
Overall, I highly recommend this domino addition lesson. I might just skip the last worksheet, or even print out two of the second worksheet, and have your child draw the dots the second time around.
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Wow, cool stuff! Thanks we’ll have to do these for science!