Lava Lamp

This is a nice simple science activity that does not take much time which is fab for busy routines and all the items needed can usually be found around the house.

Things you need

Plastic bottle or clear beaker/ glass

Water 

Any colour food dye

Vegetable oil 

Salt 

Instructions 

1. Fill 3/4 of the glass* with water and a drop of food dye. 

2. Fill the rest of the glass with vegetable oil and wait for it to settle on top

3. Sprinkle salt and watch the bubbles rise. 

Simple Science 

Why does the oil layer on top of the water? 
When the oil is added to the glass the oil will layer on top of the water. This is because water and oil do not mix. Water is denser (heavier) than oil therefore the oil floats to the top.

What happens when the salt is added?
When the salt is added it drags a bob of oil to the bottom of the glass. The salt dissolves and the oil makes its way back to the top creating bubbles

Magic Icecubes

   A lovely simple little activity which gives you the opportunity to teach children about primary colours, mixing colours, and different temperatures.


First of all we filled our ice cube trays with water and added a couple of drops of red, yellow, and blue food dye. My children love playing with water so this went down really well. We put them in the freezer and left them for around four hours.

Once the ice cubes were ready we talked about how the cold had made the water into solid ice and then popped two different coloured cubes into a glass of water and watched the water change colour. My two year old was really excited seeing the water change and my four year old was hyper guessing what colour the water would turn with different combination of ice cubes.

Oxygen experiment

 Oxygen comes from plants. Like us plants need food to give them energy. The  plants use sunlight, water. and air to make a sugar. They use this sugar to give them energy to help them grow. This is called photosynthesis.  Once they have finished making their food there is some oxygen left over. They release this oxygen so we can breathe it in. This little activity will let you see the oxygen that is released from the leaf.


We cut a healthy leaf from a plant and placed it in a glass of water and placed it in a sunny spot. 

After a hour we could see lots of little oxygen bubbles all over the leaf and the glass

We observed our leaf every few hours by the end of the day there was a lot of bubbles around the edge of the glass. We gave it a little shake and watched them float around.

Check out my blog on Joseph Priestley to find out more activities on oxygen and air.

Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/AmazingLittleMinds

Pinterest: http://pinterest.com/littlemisskirst/

What is Air?

Air is a mixture of Oxygen and other invisible gases. It is all around us but we can't see it. So if we can't see it how do we know it is there?

I used a empty pop bottle to demonstrate the existence of air. What is in the bottle?

Nothing? Right?

I squeezed the bottle onto their faces so they could feel the air blow out.

Macey squeezing the bottle so Drew can feel the air.

The air can also make things move. We can see the leaves rustling on the trees and our washing swaying on the line.


We blew through a straw to make balls of cotton move around the table.

Macey figured out she could also use the empty bottle to move the cotton balls.

Wow! Look what I can do :) 

We then made paper windmills and watched the air blow them round in the garden.

We also filled a carrier bag with air and squeezed it back out.

Filling the bag with air.

Catching it

Squeezing it out :) 

Check out my post on Joeseph Priestley to find out more activities on air and oxygen.

Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/AmazingLittleMinds

Pinterest: http://pinterest.com/littlemisskirst/

Rainbow Celery

This experiment is pretty awesome. Rainbow celery  is a fun visual experiment to show children how plants absorb water through their roots through a process called Osmosis.

Select the shorter sticks of celery that has lots of leaves for the best results. Chop around a cm off the bottom (the bit that is white) and place them in a glass with water and food dye.  I have found that blue and red seem to work the best. Over the next 24 hours we observed the colour of the leaves.

1hr later

One hour later and we can already see a tinge of blue on the tips of the leaves.

2hrs later

This day in history - Priestley discovers Oxygen

Joseph Priestley

Today is the First of August 2012. On this day 238 years ago in 1774 Joseph Priestley discovered oxygen .

Our Calendar

James Priestley was a English Scientist.

This is England!

He was a very curious man. He did lots of experiments. During his experiments he discovered Oxygen.

The symbol for Oxygen 

O is for Oxygen. Practise the Jolly Phonics. Pretend to turn a light switch on and off and say O, O,  O,O

Jolly Phonic workbook page. 

What Is Oxygen?

We can't see oxygen. It is invisible. We can't see it and we can't smell it. Oxygen is very important. Without it nothing could exist. We would not be here. Oxygen is in the air all around us and in the water we drink.  All plants and animals need to breathe. We breathe in air from our nose and our mouths.

I got my children to place their hands on their tummies and take deep breathes so they could feel the movement of their diaphragms as they breathe.

We can feel our tummies move when we breathe in and out.

 It makes its way into our lungs. The oxygen  then hitches a ride of our red blood cells and travels all around our body.

What Is Air?

Air is a mixture of Oxygen and other invisible gases. It is all around us but we can't see it. So if we can't see it how do we know it is there?

I used a empty pop bottle to demonstrate the existence of air. What is in the bottle?

Nothing? Right?

I squeezed the bottle onto their faces so they could feel the air blow out.

Macey squeezing the bottle so Drew can feel the air.

Mixing colours

Why leave teaching kids about mixing colours to paint and paper when you can make magic ice cubes, rainbow cake, and milk colour explosions instead. :)

  Magic Ice Cubes

A lovely simple little activity which gives you the opportunity to teach children about primary colours, mixing colours, and different temperatures.

First of all we filled our ice cube trays with water and added a couple of drops of red, yellow, and blue food dye. My children love playing with water so this went down really well. We put them in the freezer and left them for around four hours.

Once the ice cubes were ready we talked about how the cold had made the water into solid ice and then popped two different coloured cubes into a glass of water and watched the water change colour. My two year old was really excited seeing the water change and my four year old was hyper guessing what colour the water would turn with different combination of ice cubes.

Rainbow Cake

First of all whip up a batch of basic cake mixture and divide between six bowls.

250g butter
250g caster sugar
250g self raising flour
4 eggs
tbsp milk
drop of vanilla (or flavoring of your choice)

My Living World Pocket Microscope

My Living World Pocket Microscope

We have had lots of fun playing with the My Living World Pocket Microscope. My children have found it really amazing looking at flowers, leaves, and other materials found in the garden close up.
This is a really lovely set and only costs around ten pounds.

Product Description

Small enough to fit in your pocket, but powerful enough to make an ant look the size of an antelope! This real microscope magnifies 30 times using precision optics, and is much easier to use than those old-fashioned desk microscopes!

When you unfold the microscope, the light automatically illuminates the area in front of the lens, so that whether you are interested in nature studies, or crime-solving, this will be an invaluable companion!

Comes with sample slides and all you need to make your own slides. Works indoors and outdoors! Specimens do not need to be mounted onto slides! The colour manual gives helpful hints about how to get a close-up view of just about anything, and suggests some fascinating subject matter.

Contents

•  Illuminate pocket microscope
• Sample slide with grasshopper body part
• Sample slide with textiles
• 3 x blank microscope slides
• 12 x transparent sample covers
• 12 x labels for samples
• 4 x storage jars for samples
• Tweezers
• Colour instruction booklet

Runner Bean Experiment

This experiment was very nostalgic for me, I remember being very excited to show my parents my runner bean I had grown at school. It is simple yet very effective and fun way to show children what plants need to grow.

Firstly we looked at the effect that light has on the growth of plants. We filled two glasses full of wet cotton wool balls and planted the beans between the cotton and the glass so we could easily observe what was happening. We then used lolly pop sticks to label one glass light and the other dark.

Light vs Dark

The light glass was then placed on a sunny window sill and the dark was placed inside a cupboard. Over the next couple of weeks we checked our beans at the same time each day, watering when necessary and took pictures of our observations.

Day two

After two days we had our first sprout. My children were a little surprised to find that it was the bean planted in the dark. I explained to them that plants were very clever and the bean planted in the dark will grow faster because it needs to grow higher to try find some sunlight.

Day four

On day four the light plant had finally grown a sprout. In hind sight I should of soaked the beans in water over night before starting the experiment to make it a little quicker. My children get really excited checking on their beans everyday but this is quite a long experiment, so it is a good idea to also plant some quick growing plants in the garden or grow a sproutapouch. Children can get quite impatient waiting for things to grow.

Day 9

Day 10

Day 11

Day 12

                                                      

 By day twelve both plants had sprouted and had a stem and two leaves. The noticeable difference being that the dark plant was taller paler and had smaller leaves.

Day 13

Day 16