There's always a spark of excitement about this day!
First off we make Black Snake Fireworks that we light off outside. We do this in the safety of sand to make sure it doesn't spread. These are pretty cool and the students help mix but only the adult ever deals with fire!
We then light some money on fire. This is always a showstopper and great way for students to be awestruck! Really easy and harmless it goes quick.
We end the day by making firework cards! I luckily remembered how to make them by leaving out a crucial ingredient of SOAP!!
Check these out - so easy with supplies on hand and so fun!!
Most of the experiments again are from this resource I created below. Feel FREE to grab this FREE resource and leave me some feedback.
We started off making classic balloon rockets and testing paths for them. This gives students a chance to work together, build paths, test ideas, and figure out what gives it power.
We also did races with aluminum cans powered by static electricity! They loved trying to see whose hair had the most and use the power to drag the can across the finish line. You don't actually touch the can to the balloon just close enough that it picks up the charge and moves it.
Next up we did my Static Electricity Stations! These always have some WOW RESULTS and are so fun for kids to do! We go over the results together and explain how static electricity works.
We tested - salt and pepper, cornstarch, cinnamon, rice Krispies, gelatin
the sound effects are so cool on the Krispies - they literally look like they are being picked up from a UFO
the gelatin looks like little stalagtites!
Finally we tested different styles of paper airplanes from some diagrams I had to see which would fly furthest. The kids found this fun and was a good way to get outside. We even got to decorate our flyers! I didn't get any pictures of our plans but they loved building and testing some of the new designs I found!
We loved reading and learning about how static electricity works and how this is related to "shocking" someone and lightning.
Most of the experiments again are from this resource I created below. Feel FREE to grab this FREE resource and leave me some feedback.
This day is so much fun! You can also add a chromatography experiment in here as well just with coffee filters and different color markers.
We started off with the milk and coloring experiment using different kinds of milk. This was a great experiment is explained great in the video below.
It is so easy and I love the change of different types of milk. It adds more guessing to the day.
The top 2 were some glue one that we did.
Below is one of regular milk. We also tried cream because I had it on hand. It didn't act a whole lot different but was cool to see.
Next we have shaving cream art. This one is not strictly science related but I love a little art too and these prints are so much fun!!
Seriously these look so cool - you can also do this with Easter eggs too!
Next up we do a bleach and food coloring experiment. This is great and easy for school just make sure the adult is the one handling the bleach. It is great for learning about mixing. The video below illustrates it pretty well.
We tried all the secondary colors - purple, green, and orange to see what would happen when bleach was added. It was so interesting to see. I found myself saying, "oh cool!" and watching how the colors changed. Many did not think that it would be reversed but using our knowledge of how bleach works and the video above we figured out what was happening.
Most of the experiments again are from this resource I created below. Feel FREE to grab this FREE resource and leave me some feedback.
EEEWWW, GROSSS, I love hearing those comments in science. It's not often we get to even touch on some funny gross science, so this day is pretty special.
We have some articles we read to go along with this day from Scholastic.
The first activity we do is Petri Dish swabs. We make the solution together and decide what we want to swab. We make sure we all don't test the same thing. We are literally growing bacteria! Make sure to keep them covered in some way even just cling wrap laid over top of bowl so that nothing contaminates your samples.
Next up we make SNOT of course. We talk about how our snot helps our bodies then make a fun version for ourselves.
This was like our slime recipe only runnier. I really would have liked to use the clear glue but could not find it in the gallon size :( major bummer - that would have made it definitely look snot like.
We also read that body bugs article and it was so gross. Many of the students didn't know we had that many bugs live on/in us to help us. We had a great discussion about how not all bugs are bad.
We also blew the rice Krispies in our snot/boogers and talking about how boogers catch dust and actually help us! Cool and icky at the same time.
Most of the experiments again are from this resource I created below. Feel FREE to grab this FREE resource and leave me some feedback.
This is such a fun day because it closely relates to STEM! We start off making marshmallow shooters. I'm lucky to have 2 helpers (my mom! and a cadet teacher) to help students and this really makes this go more smoothly. Cutting the cups and attaching the balloons can be tricky so it is good to have adult help.
We follow STRICT only shoot when I tell you and NEVER at anyone or it goes straight to me or in the backpack no questions! I ended up only making about 10 of these and we took turns shooting. I always make with SOLO cups and the number on the bottom indicates the type of plastic used and 2 defintiely did not work as well as #6s did. Alas trial and error in the science world.
don't mind that we are shooting in our old woodshop - our gym was in use and outside was raining
loaded and ready to shoot
Marshmallow bridges with toothpicks and marshmallows in a certain amount of time. We can use paper and test strength as well. Definitely a challenge as I made the requirements pretty difficult. The students had a blast and really worked well on teams for this! They worked so well together and used different strategies to come up with the strongest bridge.
Next we did foil boats and looked in groups to help figure out what shape would best hold the most weight. We tested ours with pennies.
Most of the experiments again are from this resource I created below. Feel FREE to grab this FREE resource and leave me some feedback.
