Celebrating Science: July 2018

This month we celebrated Science on our social media. We wanted to share with you some of our favourite, and most simple science experiments you can practice in the classroom or at home!

RAIN CLOUDS

A great lesson on the weather!

What you need:

• Jars
• Food colouring
• Water
• Shaving cream

Method:

Pour the water into the jar, leaving some room at the top. Fill the rest of the jar with a layer of shaving cream. With the eyedropper, place the food colouring over the shaving cream ‘cloud’, and watch the food colouring ‘rain’ into the jar!

Lesson:

This is a great lesson for children on clouds! You can start the lesson on the types of clouds, including Cirrus, Cirrostratus, Cirrocumulus, Altostratus, Altocumulus, Stratus… and that is just the beginning! This experiment shows that when water droplets and ice crystals collect in a cloud, they get heavier. They will eventually become too heavy to float on the air. Water droplets will fall to the earth as rain.

We got this great idea from The Happy Housewife

LAVA LAMPS

Teach your students about density!

What you need:

• Jars
• Food colouring
• Water
• A funnel
• Effervescent tablets (we used dissolvable aspirin)
• An eyedropper
• Vegetable oil

Method:

With the funnel, pour oil into 3/4 of the jar, top the rest off with water. With the eyedropper, carefully place drops of food colouring into the jars. Place your effervescent tablet into the jar… and watch the magic happen! To continue the fun, add another effervescent tablet.

Lesson:

This is a great lesson for children on density! Water is denser than oil so it sinks to the bottom, when you add the tablet, the gas created rises and takes some of the coloured water into the oil!

WALKING WATER

Gravity, plants AND water – this experiment covers it all!

What you need:

• Water
• Three jars
• Folded paper towels
• Food colouring (we used yellow and blue)
• Eyedropper

Method:

Fill the outer jars to the top with water. With the eyedropper, add one colour to one outer jar and another colour to the other. Place the folded paper towels so that one end is in the jar filled with water, and the other is in the ipty jar. Now, wait. It might take an hour or so (depending on the paper towel) but slowly, you will see the water creep up the towel and drip into the ipty jar.

Lesson:

The paper towel is made up of fibres, between which are gaps that act like capillary tubes that suck the water upwards! This is a good dionstration of how water travels up from the roots of a plant to the highest leaf!

FIZZY BALLOONS

Learn about chiical reactions!

What you need:

• An ipty Bottle
• Vinegar
• Bi-carb Soda
• A funnel
• A Teaspoon
• Balloons

Method:

Use the funnel to fill the ipty bottle, just under halfway with the vinegar (use a lot less than what we did). Dry the funnel, and use it to place 1 teaspoon of bi-carb soda into a balloon. Wrap the end of the balloon around the bottle making sure to keep the heavy end of the balloon down. Gently lift the balloon up, iptying the bi-carb soda into the bottle, and watch the instant reaction!

Lesson:

This is a great lesson in chiical reactions for younger students! When the vinegar and bi-carb soda mix it creates a chiical reaction which we see from the instant fizzing. This reaction creates carbon dioxide gas, which inflates the balloon!

MAGIC MILK

Another lesson on chiical reactions!

What you need:

• Milk
• Dishwashing liquid
• A plate
• Food colouring
• An Eyedropper
• Cotton buds

Method:

Fill the plate with milk so it covers the base. With the eyedropper, add one colour at a time into the plate of milk. Cover the tip of your cotton bud in your dishwashing liquid and place into the milk. You will see the colours move around the plate. Have a play with different places around the plate, topping up your cotton bud with more soap when needed.

Lesson:

Milk is made up of mostly water but it does contain vitamins, minerals, proteins and small droplets of fat. The fat and proteins are sensitive to changes in the milk and when the dishwashing liquid is added a chiical reaction occurs. The soap and fat work to join together, which causes the movient. When food colouring is added we are able to witness this chiical reaction occurring. You can try this in your classroom with different types of milk!