Summer Science 3- Experiments

Lets mix, pour and alter things with simple chemistry!

The big thing this summer for Hg was/is Science Experiments!  She often wants to do projects or experiments and I am 110% encouraging of this.  As for the experiments- she's already been predisposed to baking soda & vinegar, cornstarch & water, diet soda & mentos as well as other benign experiments.  She's also been privy to any number of explosions, dry ice fun, rocket launches, etc.

Best, easiest summer science experiment?  H20! Make some ice, melt some ice.  Add color, add fruit and eat it, add it to water and make it colder.  It's sooo simple here are some ideas:

  

As I mentioned Hg loves experiments so I found a little folding table and put it outside as her work space.  I put her chalk, buckets, finger paints etc. that she usually plays with in a container under it.  I also included a large bucket for water and a deep pan for a reservoir to contain the experiments.  I also made a science kit for her to get out on her own and play.

 

Science Kit contents:

Insta Snow power

Mixing Cup

Corn Starch

Small cups

Baking Soda

Food Coloring

Vinegar (in water bottle, clearly labled)

Measuring cups

Large cups

I marked a line on the mixing cup so Hg would know where to fill it for the Insta Snow but otherwise the mixtures for everything is somewhat open ended. The food coloring does get her messy so sometimes I nix it.  We fill the metal bucket full of water so she can scoop it and wash her hands as needed.

Experiment 1.- Baking Soda and Vinegar: 

Easy peasy.  Put some baking soda in the pan, pour in some vinegar and see what happens.  Pour the baking soda into some different shaped/height cups and see which one bubbles over the edge quickest.  

  

 For starters you can use separate containers of baking soda and vinegar, pre-measured. You can also add color and let it dry on paper to make art! Just watch where you pour this one when you're done, too much vinegar can hurt grass.

Experiment 2.- Non-Newtonian Fluid (cornstarch and water) 

 

Mix Cornstarch and water.  Add coloring if you like.  Too liquidy? Add more cornstarch.  Too solid? Add more water.  The goo is solid when you put pressure on it but liquid when you don't!

Experiment 3.- Snow

 

You can buy Insta Snow powder online or at science/toy stores.  The powder is sodium polyacrylate and you add water to it until it's the consistency you want.  I marked a line so Hg would know the level of water to add to get fluffy snow but sometimes she adds more to get it more slushy.  The stuff is cool to the touch and really fun to play with.  The sodium polyacrylate is an additive to some garden chemical to keep soil moist so it is safe to throw out in the yard when you're done.  (I have with no adverse effects).

These experiments your child can do on his/her own!  They LOVE that independence.  Just think to how much they love to help you cook and measure things out but that usually requires supervision and they can't always follow through because of safety concerns (ovens/stoves/etc.).  This, they can do all by themselves!

Here are a few other science experiments we've done that did require some help from me:

 

Growing crystals

Making bathtub paint with ivory soap

Recipe here:  http://www.housingaforest.com/fluffy-bathtub-paint/

Make a Lemon Battery

Summer Science 2- Water!

Water is fun and filled with science lessons!

Who doesn't love to splash in the water when it's warm outside?  Little kids especially love it (splashing particularly)  It's a good idea to get your little one used to water early so they aren't too apprehensive when they're older.  The more comfortable they are in the water the more safe they are, as long as you teach them water safety and practice it.  Swim lessons, pool and lake excursions, boating, sprinklers and playing in the rain are all great things to do but make it a learning experience by talking about water scientifically.  

You can talk about buoyancy, density, plants & animals that live in water, viscosity, disbursement, water cycle, every living thing needs water to grow, weather...

  

Will my art stay here?  The chalk acts differently when its wet...why?

Can I still mix colors?

Water currents/flow rates.  Why is there a river in our yard?

Why does the water fly when I just into it?

 

   

Why does the canoe float/rock?  Why are there ripples?

How does the paddle work?  How does my life vest work?

Why is the water cloudy?  

Which container fills the quickest? Which holds the most water?

Does it fill more slowly?  Why do my clothes get heavy when their wet?

 

Why are there waves? Why does the tide come in and out?

Why doesn't the water stay in the hole I dug?

Why are the clouds dark?  How does it rain?

Where does the rain go?  Why does it rain sometimes and snow others?

There are many opportunities to embellish everyday activities and experiences with learning.  Take them.

Summer Science 1- Exploring the Outdoors

Get outside and learn something!

To start with for summer science we gardened a bunch!  You can get (especially at the end of the season) little kid sized gardening tools, gloves, etc. that make them feel like they're being productive in the garden too or you can let them use your spare tools (or, especially great, just let them did with their hands!  Hg wants to use the tools just like me and I got tired of sharing with her so I just got her a set of her own).

 

Also, HIKING and exploring nature.  I've nannied for a few families and come across kids at age 7 that don't know what hiking is.  There are a myriad of places to explore nature and you don't have to just drive out into a wooded area.  A gathering of trees adjacent to a park, a small stream, an area lake, a nature center, an area farm/zoo.  The point is to involve kids in the natural world around them so that they gain an appreciation for plants and animals.  I teach about agriculture at this age; how plants and animals grown and where our food comes from.  Tell children about our ecosystem and the importance of keeping nature pollution free, about endangered animals and why we recycle.  But words, on this subject as well as others, aren't enough.  Kids love the outdoors so let them go out and do things and through this they'll gain an appreciation and respect for it.  Supplement what they're experiencing by explaining what they're seeing and why it's important/interesting.

 

Grasshopper in the front yard                       Hiking 

  

Feeding goats                         Wild Turtle

Activity Ideas:

Get a magnifying glass and look at things close up

Get a net/other bug catching devise and "hunt"

I.D. flowers & trees

I.D. animal tracks

Get some binoculars and bird watch

Do a scavenger hunt based on things that begin with.... or the color....

How many ..... (objects, orange things, birds, square shapes) can you find?

Gather leaves, sticks, etc to make art with

Draw in the dirt, play in the mud

Climb trees

Follow the leader

Make a map/follow a map

Clay dug up from the yard + leaves, rocks and sticks = kitty cats

If you need help finding places to go local conservation departments are great starts!  

Here are some Kansas City area places that are superb:

KC Zoo (Kansas City, Swope Park)

Lakeside Nature Center (KC, by Swope Park)

Burr Oak Woods Nature Center (Blue Springs)

Deanna Rose Children's Farmstead (Overland Park)

Anita B. Gorman Discovery Center (Plaza)

George Owens Nature Park (Independence)

Overland Park Arboretum

Loose Park (Plaza)

Powell Gardens (Kingsville, MO)

Faulkner's Ranch (Raytown, MO)

End of Year/Summer Busyness

So.. the end of the year really kept me busy and then it got even more intense when I immediately started a new (summer) job at Science City (our science center in KC) teaching technology in their summer camp.  The week of the 4th is a reprieve as I have the whole week off and I will finish up all of the half posts I have waiting to be published.  If you are interested in what's going on with me/Science City this summer check out their "ScienceCity SummerCamp" Facebook page or my blog for what I'm doing in technology class here: http://teachingkidstomake.blogspot.com/.


By the way.....Have you heard of Maker Faire Kansas City?

Look into it here:   http://www.makerfairekc.com/
I'll be there with a wearable technology booth!  Come and see the most amazing science and technology things going on in the KC area!

The Arctic

Wrapping up Winter we recently studied the Arctic.  

Here are some of the activities, projects and works we did:  

 

Winter exploration work on the wall with winter images.

Spooning/Scooping "snowballs".

Two works that are always present in my bi-weekly topics (animal habitats) are the felt story board with felt animals from the appropriate biome and the biome table which houses a mock habitat (3d or pictorial  sometimes with real plants, dirt, sand, water, etc.) and small plastic animals which the child can interact with. This habitat is blue foam for a lake and a water hole (the killer whale is on top of it here) and a combination of batting and cotton balls all hot glued onto on old, stained art tray.

Arctic Habitat and animals.

And even though I could not have a frozen arctic tundra for the little animals to live on I wanted to bring in some snow and ice from outside for the students to interact with.  We talked about the arctic people and animals and then got to play with snow, the whole time I talked about how it is cold and wet and what the people and animals of the arctic adapt to this.

Our hallway art for the unit:

Aurora Borealis with igloo and penguins (we talked about both the Aurora Borealis and Aurora Australis)-  water colored sky glued onto white paper.  Then we colored the penguins and glued them and the igloos onto the snowy white ground.  Polar bear paintings- we started with BLUE polar bears....polar bears are NOT BLUE.  So we HAD to paint them WHITE.  This was a really fun and goofy art project.

That about wraps it up, next up is grasslands and Springtime (although as I look out the window this day after Spring officially began it is snowing...).

Happy Snow

We are quite happy with the two snow days this week.  Here's my Montessori toddler playing with a dustpan and broom in the snow:

  

                                                                        (snow angel)

I hope all of you are staying warm and safe in the winter weather!

Montessori in the News (Kind of)

This past week Montessori got attention, but only to those who know about Montessori.  The president visited a school in Decatur,Georgia as part of his plan to expand the nation's preschool programs.  Though, College Heights Early Childhood Learning Center does not project itself as a Montessori school it clearly contains Montessori materials.  Here's to president Obama seeing and interacting with Montessori materials! (Makes me want to invite him to my school):

These children, along with president Obama, are working with the pink tower and the broad stair.  These materials belong to a family of Montessori materials called sensorial materials.  Sensorial materials are used to help the child concentrate on and refine his sensory skills so that he can make classifications within his environment.  The materials were designed to isolate the one quality that the child is to focus on.

Pictured above are the broad stair and pink tower in their standard configurations, once the child has mastered this he is allowed to expand upon these configurations with guides that the teacher provides, eventually combining both works, and then designing configurations of his own.

 

 

Toddlers can easily work with a half set of the pink tower and broad stair, i.e. every other one, five total.  They can also do extensions and combinations with guides.

Her first solo pink tower completion.

 

 

I usually let them/have them work together for the combination extensions where the pink tower and broad stair are used together.  There are a lot of materials involved and the toddler brain has a tendency to overload and shut down when things are too many in number and overwhelming   Also, it lets them learn how to share and collaborate towards a common goal.  All Montessori toddler programs should include these fundamental sensorial materials in their curriculum!