FTC Forum
ENGLISH => GENERAL => Topic started by: MysteRy on October 07, 2014, 08:51:32 PM
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Enjoy fun science experiments for kids that feature awesome hands-on projects and activities that help bring the exciting world of science to life.
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Make an Egg Float in Salt Water
An egg sinks to the bottom if you drop it into a glass of ordinary drinking water but what happens if you add salt? The results are very interesting and can teach you some fun facts about density.
What you'll need:
One egg
Water
Salt
A tall drinking glass
Instructions:
Pour water into the glass until it is about half full.
Stir in lots of salt (about 6 tablespoons).
Carefully pour in plain water until the glass is nearly full (be careful to not disturb or mix the salty water with the plain water).
Gently lower the egg into the water and watch what happens.
What's happening?
Salt water is denser than ordinary tap water, the denser the liquid the easier it is for an object to float in it. When you lower the egg into the liquid it drops through the normal tap water until it reaches the salty water, at this point the water is dense enough for the egg to float. If you were careful when you added the tap water to the salt water, they will not have mixed, enabling the egg to amazingly float in the middle of the glass.
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Melting Chocolate
Enjoy this simple melting chocolate experiment for kids. You've no doubt experienced chocolate melting on a hot day, so let's do some experiments to recreate these conditions as well as a few others before comparing results and coming to some conclusions.
At what temperature does chocolate go from a solid to a liquid? Is it different for white and dark chocolate? Give this fun science experiment a try and find out!
What you'll need:
Small chocolate pieces of the same size (chocolate bar squares or chocolate chips are a good idea)
Paper plates
Pen and paper to record your results
Instructions:
Put one piece of chocolate on a paper plate and put it outside in the shade.
Record how long it took for the chocolate to melt or if it wasn't hot enough to melt then record how soft it was after 10 minutes.
Repeat the process with a piece of chocolate on a plate that you put outside in the sun. Record your results in the same way.
Find more interesting locations to test how long it takes for the chocolate pieces to melt. You could try your school bag, hot water or even your own mouth.
Compare your results, in what conditions did the chocolate melt? You might also like to record the temperatures of the locations you used using a thermometer so you can think about what temperature chocolate melts at.
What's happening?
At a certain temperature your chocolate pieces undergo a physical change, from a solid to a liquid (or somewhere in between). On a hot day, sunlight is usually enough to melt chocolate, something you might have unfortunately already experienced. You can also reverse the process by putting the melted chocolate into a fridge or freezer where it will go from a liquid back to a solid. The chocolate probably melted quite fast if you tried putting a piece in your mouth, what does this tell you about the temperature of your body? For further testing and experiments you could compare white choclate and dark chocolate, do they melt at the same temperature? How about putting a sheet of aluminium foil between a paper plate and a piece of chocolate in the sun, what happens then?
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Mixing Oil and Water
Some things just don't get along well with each other. Take oil and water as an example, you can mix them together and shake as hard as you like but they'll never become friends.....or will they? Take this fun experiment a step further and find out how bringing oil and water together can help you do your dishes.
What you'll need:
Small soft drink bottle
Water
Food colouring
2 tablespoons of cooking oil
Dish washing liquid or detergent
Instructions:
Add a few drops of food colouring to the water.
Pour about 2 tablespoons of the coloured water along with the 2 tablespoons of cooking oil into the small soft drink bottle.
Screw the lid on tight and shake the bottle as hard as you can.
Put the bottle back down and have a look, it may have seemed as though the liquids were mixing together but the oil will float back to the top.
What's happening?
While water often mixes with other liquids to form solutions, oil and water does not. Water molecules are strongly attracted to each other, this is the same for oil, because they are more attracted to their own molecules they just don't mix together. They separate and the oil floats above the water because it has a lower density.
If you really think oil and water belong together then try adding some dish washing liquid or detergent. Detergent is attracted to both water and oil helping them all join together and form something called an emulsion. This is extra handy when washing those greasy dishes, the detergent takes the oil and grime off the plates and into the water, yay!
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Make Your Own Quick Sand
Quick sand is a fascinating substance, make some of your own and experiment on a safe scale. Amaze your friends by demonstrating how it works.
What you'll need:
1 cup of maize cornflour
Half a cup of water
A large plastic container
A spoon
Instructions:
This one is simple, just mix the cornflour and water thoroughly in the container to make your own instant quick sand.
When showing other people how it works, stir slowly and drip the quick sand to show it is a liquid.
Stirring it quickly will make it hard and allow you to punch or poke it quickly (this works better if you do it fast rather than hard).
Remember that quick sand is messy, try to play with it outside and don’t forget to stir just before you use it.
Always stir instant quicksand just before you use it!
What's happening?
If you add just the right amount of water to cornflour it becomes very thick when you stir it quickly. This happens because the cornflour grains are mixed up and can’t slide over each other due to the lack of water between them. Stirring slowly allows more water between the cornflour grains, letting them slide over each other much easier.
Poking it quickly has the same effect, making the substance very hard. If you poke it slowly it doesn’t mix up the mixture in the same way, leaving it runny. It works in much the same way as real quick sand.
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Baking Soda & Vinegar Volcano
Use baking soda and vinegar to create an awesome chemical reaction! Watch as it rapidly fizzes over the container and make sure you've got some towels ready to clean up.
What you'll need:
Baking Soda (make sure it's not baking powder)
Vinegar
A container to hold everything and avoid a big mess!
Paper towels or a cloth (just in case)
Instructions:
Place some of the baking soda into your container.
Pour in some of the vinegar
Watch as the reaction takes place!
What's happening?
The baking soda (sodium bicarbonate) is a base while the vinegar (acetic acid) is an acid. When they react together they form carbonic acid which is very unstable, it instantly breaks apart into water and carbon dioxide, which creates all the fizzing as it escapes the solution.
For extra effect you can make a realistic looking volcano. It takes some craft skills but it will make your vinegar and baking soda eruptions will look even more impressive!
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Raw or Boiled Egg?
Surprise your friends and family with an easy science experiment that answers an otherwise tricky question. Two eggs look and feel the same but there is a big difference, one is raw and the other hard boiled, find out which is which with this fun experiment.
What you'll need:
Two eggs, one hard boiled and one raw. Make sure the hard boiled egg has been in the fridge long enough to be the same temperature as the raw egg.
Instructions:
Spin the eggs and watch what happens, one egg should spin while the other wobbles.
You can also lightly touch each of the eggs while they are spinning, one should stop quickly while the other keeps moving after you have touched it.
What's happening?
The raw egg's centre of gravity changes as the white and yolk move around inside the shell, causing the wobbling motion. Even after you touch the shell it continues moving. This is because of inertia, the same type of force you feel when you change direction or stop suddenly in a car, your body wants to move one way while the car wants to do something different. Inertia causes the raw egg to spin even after you have stopped it, this contrasts with the solid white and yolk of the hard boiled egg, it responds much quicker if you touch it.
This is a good experiment to test a friend or someone in your family with, see if they can figure out how to tell the difference between the eggs (without smashing them of course) before showing them your nifty trick.
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Make Glowing Water
Make glowing water with the help of a black light in this fun science experiment for kids.
Tonic water doesn't look very strange under normal light but what happens when you look at it under a black light? Does the dye from a highlighter pen do the same thing? Find out what happens and why it happens with this cool experiment that you can do at home.
What you'll need:
A black light (you can find them at places like Walmart and hardware stores, as well as online stores like Amazon).
Tonic water or a highlighter pen.
A dark room to do the experiment.
Instructions:
If you are using a highlighter pen carefully break it open, remove the felt and soak it in a small amount of water for a few minutes.
Find a dark room.
Turn on the black light near your water, how does it look?
What's happening?
Simple explanation:
The ultra violet (UV) light coming from your black light lamp excites things called phosphors. Tonic water and the dye from highlighter pens contain phosphors that turn UV light (light we can’t see) into visible light (light we can see). That’s why your water glows in the dark when you shine a black light on it.
Black lights are used in forensic science, artistic performances, photography, authentication of banknotes and antiques, and in many other areas.
Detailed explanation:
Black light (also known as UV or ultra violet light) is a part of the electromagnetic spectrum. The electromagnetic spectrum also includes infrared, X-rays, visible light (what the human eye can see) and other types of electromagnetic radiation. A black light lamp such as the one you used emits a UV light that can illuminate objects and materials that contain phosphors. Phosphors are special substances that emit light (luminescence) when excited by radiation. Your water glowed under the black light because it contained phosphors. If you used a highlighter pen then the UV light reacted with phosphors in the dye. If you used tonic water then the UV light reacted with phosphors in a chemical used in tonic water called quinine.
There are different types of luminescence, they include fluorescence (used in this experiment, it glows only when the black light is on), phosphorescence (similar to fluorescence but with a glow that can last even after the black light is turned off), chemiluminescence (used to create glow sticks), bioluminescence (from living organisms) and many others.
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Relax with Beautiful Bath Salts
Whether you're making a special present for someone else, experimenting at home or just want to relax in a hot bath, give this experiment a go. Create your own bath salts with a variety of refreshing fragrances, experiment with different essential oils to see which you like best.
What you'll need:
1 cup of washing soda
A plastic bag
A rolling pin (or something similar that can crush lumps)
A bowl
A spoon for stirring
Essential oil
Food coloring
Instructions:
Take the cup of washing soda and put it into a plastic bag. Crush the lumps with a rolling pin or similar object.
Empty the bag into a bowl and stir in 5 or 6 drops of your favorite essential oil such as rosemary, lavender or mint.
Stir in a few drops of food coloring until the mixture is evenly colored.
Put the mixture into clean dry containers and enjoy as you please.
What's happening?
Bath Salts are typically made from Epsom salts (magnesium sulfate), table salt (sodium chloride) or washing soda (sodium carbonate). The chemical make up of the mixture makes it easy to form a lather. Bath salts are said to improve cleaning and deliver an appealing fragrance when bathing.
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Grow Your Own Bacteria
Bacteria are a fascinating type of microorganism that play a large role in our lives whether we like it or not. Try growing your own sample of bacteria while monitoring how it reproduces in a short space of time. Compare your original sample with others and get proof that bacteria truly are everywhere!
What you'll need:
Petrie dish of agar
Cotton buds
Some old newspaper (to wrap petrie dish when disposing)
Instructions:
Prepare your petrie dish of agar.
Using your cotton bud, swab a certain area of your house (i.e. collect a sample by rubbing the cotton bud on a surface of your choice).
Rub the swab over the agar with a few gentle strokes before putting the lid back on and sealing the petrie dish.
Allow the dish to sit in a warm area for 2 or 3 days.
Check the growth of the bacteria each day by making an observational drawing and describing the changes.
Try repeating the process with a new petrie dish and swab from under your finger nails or between your toes.
Dispose of the bacteria by wrapping up the petrie dish in old newspaper and placing in the rubbish (don't open the lid).
What's happening?
The agar plate and warm conditions provide the ideal place for bacteria to grow. The microorganisms on the plate will grow into individual colonies, each a clone of the original. The bacteria you obtained with the cotton bud grows steadily, becoming visible with the naked eye in a relatively short time. Different samples produce different results, what happened when you took a swab sample from your own body?
You will find bacteria throughout the Earth, it grows in soil, radioactive waste, water, on plants and even animals too (humans included). Thankfully for us, our immune system usually does a great job of making bacteria harmless.
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Use a Straw to Stab a Potato
Is it possible to stab a potato with a drinking straw? Find out with this fun science experiment for kids that shows how air pressure can be used in surprising ways.
What you'll need:
Stiff plastic drinking straws
A raw potato
Instructions:
Hold a plastic drinking straw by it sides (without covering the hole at the top) and try quickly stabbing the potato, what happens?
Repeat the experiment with a new straw but this time place your thumb over the top, covering the hole.
What's happening?
Placing your thumb over the hole at the top of the straw improves your ability to pierce the potato skin and push the straw deep into the potato. The first time you tried the experiment you may have only pierced the potato a small amount, so why are you more successful on the second attempt?
Covering the top of the straw with your thumb traps the air inside, forcing it to compress as you stab the straw through the potato skin. This makes the straw strong enough to pierce the potato, unlike the first attempt where the air is pushed out of the straw.
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Dissolving Sugar at Different Heats
Learn about solutions as you add more and more sugar cubes to different temperature water. This easy experiment shows that you can only dissolve a certain amount and that this changes as the water gets hotter.
What you'll need:
Sugar cubes
Cold water in a clear glass
Hot water in a clear glass (be careful with the hot water)
Spoon for stirring
Instructions:
Make sure the glasses have an equal amount of water.
Put a sugar cube into the cold water and stir with the spoon until the sugar disappears. Repeat this process (remembering to count the amount of sugar cubes you put into the water) until the sugar stops dissolving, you are at this point when sugar starts to gather on the bottom of the glass rather than dissolving.
Write down how many sugar cubes you could dissolve in the cold water.
Repeat the same process for the hot water, compare the number of sugar cubes dissolved in each liquid, which dissolved more?
What's happening?
The cold water isn't able to dissolve as much sugar as the hot water, but why? Another name for the liquids inside the cups is a 'solution', when this solution can no longer dissolve sugar it becomes a 'saturated solution', this means that sugar starts forming on the bottom of the cup.
The reason the hot water dissolves more is because it has faster moving molecules which are spread further apart than the molecules in the cold water. With bigger gaps between the molecules in the hot water, more sugar molecules can fit in between.
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Making Music with Water
Have you ever tried making music with glasses or bottles filled with water? I bet you favourite band hasn't. Experiment with your own special sounds by turning glasses of water into instruments, make some cool music and find out how it works.
What you'll need:
5 or more drinking glasses or glass bottles
Water
Wooden stick such as a pencil
Instructions:
Line the glasses up next to each other and fill them with different amounts of water. The first should have just a little water while the last should almost full, the ones in between should have slightly more than the last.
Hit the glass with the least amount of water and observe the sound, then hit the glass with the most water, which makes the higher sound?
Hit the other glasses and see what noise they make, see if you can get a tune going by hitting the glasses in a certain order.
What's happening?
Each of the glasses will have a different tone when hit with the pencil, the glass with the most water will have the lowest tone while the glass with the least water will have the highest. Small vibrations are made when you hit the glass, this creates sound waves which travel through the water. More water means slower vibrations and a deeper tone.
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Use a Balloon to Amplify Sound
Small sounds can still make a big noise when you use a good sound conductor. Experiment with a balloon, compressed air and your own ears to find out how it works and the science behind it.
What you'll need:
Balloon
Instructions:
Blow up the balloon.
Hold the balloon close to your ear while you tap lightly on the other side.
What's happening?
Despite you only tapping lightly on the balloon your ears can hear the noise loudly. When you blew up the balloon you forced the air molecules inside the balloon closer to each other. Because the air molecules inside the balloon are closer together, they become a better conductor of sound waves than the ordinary air around you.
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Make a Ping Pong Ball Float
Can you control a ping pong ball as it floats above a hair dryer? Put your hand-eye coordination skills to the test while learning the important role that forces such as gravity and air pressure play in this simple experiment for kids.
What you'll need:
At least 1 ping pong ball (2 or 3 would be great)
A hair dryer
Instructions:
Plug in the hair dryer and turn it on.
Put it on the highest setting and point it straight up.
Place your ping pong ball above the hair dryer and watch what happens.
What's happening?
Your ping pong ball floats gently above the hair dryer without shifting sideways or flying across the other side of the room. The airflow from the hair dryer pushes the ping pong ball upwards until its upward force equals the force of gravity pushing down on it. When it reaches this point it gently bounces around, floating where the upward and downward forces are equal.
The reason the ping pong ball stays nicely inside the column of air produced by the hair dryer without shifting sideways is due to air pressure. The fast moving air from the hair dryer creates a column of lower air pressure, the surrounding higher air pressure forces the ping pong ball to stay inside this column, making it easy to move the hair dryer around without losing control of the ping pong ball.
See if you can float 2 or even 3 ping pong balls as an extra challenge.
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Crazy Putty
Using some everyday household items such as borax, water, PVA glue and food coloring, make some crazy putty that you can squish in your hands, mould into shapes or even bounce on the ground.
What you'll need:
2 containers (1 smaller than the other, preferably a film canister)
Water
Food colouring
PVA glue (a type of white glue also known as Elmer's glue)
Borax solution (ratio of about 1 Tbsp of borax to a cup of water)
Instructions:
Fill the bottom of the larger container with PVA glue.
Add a few squirts of water and stir.
Add 2 or 3 drops of food colouring and stir.
Add a squirt of borax (possibly a bit more depending on how much PVA glue you used).
Stir the mixture up and put it into the smaller container. By now the mixture should be joining together, acting like putty, crazy putty!
What's happening?
The PVA glue you use is a type of polymer called polyvinyl acetate (PVA for short), while the borax is made of a chemical called sodium borate. When you combine the two in a water solution, the borax reacts with the glue molecules, joining them together into one giant molecule. This new compound is able to absorb large amounts of water, producing a putty like substance which you can squish in your hands or even bounce.
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Experience Gravity Free Water
What goes up must come down right? Well try bending the rules a little with a cup of water that stays inside the glass when held upside down. You'll need the help of some cardboard and a little bit of air pressure.
What you'll need:
A glass filled right to the top with water
A piece of cardboard
Instructions:
Put the cardboard over the mouth of the glass, making sure that no air bubbles enter the glass as you hold onto the cardboard.
Turn the glass upside down (over a sink or outside until you get good).
Take away your hand holding the cardboard.
What's happening?
If all goes to plan then the cardboard and water should stay put. Even though the cup of water is upside down the water stays in place, defying gravity! So why is this happening? With no air inside the glass, the air pressure from outside the glass is greater than the pressure of the water inside the glass. The extra air pressure manages to hold the cardboard in place, keeping you dry and your water where it should be, inside the glass.
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What is Your Lung Volume?
Do you think you're fit and healthy? Let's test your lung volume to find out. Just how much air can your lungs can hold? With the help of a few simple household objects, some scientific know how and a dash of curiosity you can make this experiment look easy.
What you'll need:
Clean plastic tubing
A large plastic bottle
Water
Kitchen sink or large water basin
Instructions:
Make sure the plastic tubing is clean
Put about 10cm of water into your kitchen sink.
Fill the plastic bottle right to the top with water.
Put your hand over the top of the bottle to stop water escaping when you turn it upside down.
Turn the bottle upside down. Place the top of the bottle under the water in the sink before removing your hand.
Push one end of the plastic tube into the bottle.
Take a big breath in.
Breathe out as much air as you can through the tube.
Measure the volume of air your lungs had in them.
Make sure you clean up the area to finish.
What's happening?
As you breathe out through the tube, the air from your lungs takes the place of the water in the bottle. If you made sure you took a big breath in and breathed out fully then the resulting volume of water you pushed out is equivalent to how much air your lungs can hold. Having a big air capacity in your lungs means you can distribute oxygen around your body at a faster rate. The air capacity of lungs (or VO2 max) increases naturally as children grow up but can also be increased with regular exercise.
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Bucket Spinning
You might think that an upside down bucket of water above your head would end up with you getting very wet but what if the bucket is spinning quickly in a circular motion? Give this fun science experiment for kids a try and see what happens while learning a thing or two about centripetal force.
What you'll need:
A reliable bucket with a strong handle
Water
An open area outside where spilling some water is ok.
Instructions:
Fill the bucket until it is around half full with water.
Stand well clear of other people or anything else that could get in the way.
Hold the bucket by its handle with your arm extended and start spinning it by your side towards the sky and back to the ground in a circular motion, make sure to spin it fast enough to keep the water inside the bucket. Be prepared to get a little wet as your technique improves.
Stop spinning before your arm gets tired, watching out for splashes as you carefully bring the bucket back to rest on the ground.
What's happening?
There's half a bucket of water spinning upside down above your head and yet it's not falling out and getting you wet, what's going on?
This experiment makes use of something called 'centripetal force', which is a force acting on an object moving in a circular path, directed towards the center around which it is moving. This type of force can also be seen on roller coasters or by satellites in orbit around a planet.
As you spin the bucket you might feel that it wants to fly off in a straight line away from you (you might even accidentally let go of it), this is a demonstration of Newton's first law of motion, that an object will continue in a straight line unless an outside force (in this case your arm) acts upon it.
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Make a Crystal Snowflake!
Learn how to make a snowflake using borax and a few other easy to find household items. Find out how crystals are formed in this fun crystal activity, experiment with food coloring to enhance the look and keep your finished crystal snowflake as a great looking decoration!
What you'll need:
String
Wide mouth jar
White pipe cleaners
Blue food coloring (optional)
Boiling water (take care or better still get an adult to help)
Borax
Small wooden rod or pencil
Instructions:
Grab a white pipe cleaner and cut it into three sections of the same size. Twist these sections together in the center so that you now have a shape that looks something like a six-sided star. Make sure the points of your shape are even by trimming them to the same length.
Take the top of one of the pipe cleaners and attach another piece of string to it. Tie the opposite end to your small wooden rod or pencil. You will use this to hang your completed snowflake.
Carefully fill the jar with boiling water (you might want to get an adult to help with this part).
For each cup of water add three tablespoons of borax, adding one tablespoon at a time. Stir until the mixture is dissolved but don’t worry if some of the borax settles at the base of the jar.
Add some of the optional blue food coloring if you'd like to give your snowflake a nice bluish tinge.
Put the pipe cleaner snowflake into the jar so that the small wooden rod or pencil is resting on the edge of the jar and the snowflake is sitting freely in the borax solution.
Leave the snowflake overnight and when you return in the morning you will find the snowflake covered in crystals! It makes a great decoration that you can show your friends or hang somewhere in your house.
What's happening?
Crystals are made up of molecules arranged in a repeating pattern that extends in all three dimensions. Borax is also known as sodium borate, it is usually found in the form of a white powder made up of colorless crystals that are easily dissolved in water.
When you add the borax to the boiling water you can dissolve more than you could if you were adding it to cold water, this is because warmer water molecules move around faster and are more spread apart, allowing more room for the borax crystals to dissolve.
When the solution cools, the water molecules move closer together and it can't hold as much of the borax solution. Crystals begin to form on top of each other and before you know it you have your completed crystal snow flake!
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Invisible Ink with Lemon Juice
Making invisible ink is a lot of fun, you can pretend you are a secret agent as you keep all your secret codes and messages hidden from others. All you need is some basic household objects and the hidden power of lemon juice.
What you'll need:
Half a lemon
Water
Spoon
Bowl
Cotton bud
White paper
Lamp or other light bulb
Instructions:
Squeeze some lemon juice into the bowl and add a few drops of water.
Mix the water and lemon juice with the spoon.
Dip the cotton bud into the mixture and write a message onto the white paper.
Wait for the juice to dry so it becomes completely invisible.
When you are ready to read your secret message or show it to someone else, heat the paper by holding it close to a light bulb.
What's happening?
Lemon juice is an organic substance that oxidizes and turns brown when heated. Diluting the lemon juice in water makes it very hard to notice when you apply it the paper, no one will be aware of its presence until it is heated and the secret message is revealed. Other substances which work in the same way include orange juice, honey, milk, onion juice, vinegar and wine. Invisible ink can also be made using chemical reactions or by viewing certain liquids under ultraviolet (UV) light.
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Make an Easy Lava Lamp
Learn how to make an easy lava lamp with this fun science experiment for kids. Use simple household items such as vegetable oil, food coloring, Alka-Seltzer and a bottle to create chemical reactions and funky balls of color that move around like a real lava lamp.
What you'll need:
Water
A clear plastic bottle
Vegetable oil
Food coloring
Alka-Seltzer (or other tablets that fizz)
Instructions:
Pour water into the plastic bottle until it is around one quarter full (you might want to use a funnel when filling the bottle so you don't spill anything).
Pour in vegetable oil until the bottle is nearly full.
Wait until the oil and water have separated.
Add around a dozen drops of food coloring to the bottle (choose any color you like).
Watch as the food coloring falls through the oil and mixes with the water.
Cut an Alka-Seltzer tablet into smaller pieces (around 5 or 6) and drop one of them into the bottle, things should start getting a little crazy, just like a real lava lamp!
When the bubbling stops, add another piece of Alka-Seltzer and enjoy the show!
What's happening?
If you've tried our oil and water experiment you'll know that the two don't mix very well. The oil and water you added to the bottle separate from each other, with oil on top because it has a lower density than water. The food coloring falls through the oil and mixes with the water at the bottom. The piece of Alka-Seltzer tablet you drop in after releases small bubbles of carbon dioxide gas that rise to the top and take some of the colored water along for the ride. The gas escapes when it reaches the top and the colored water falls back down. The reason Alka-Seltzer fizzes in such a way is because it contains citric acid and baking soda (sodium bicarbonate), the two react with water to form sodium citrate and carbon dioxide gas (those are the bubbles that carry the colored water to the top of the bottle).
Adding more Alka-Seltzer to the bottle keeps the reaction going so you can enjoy your funky lava lamp for longer. If you want to show someone later you can simply screw on a bottle cap and add more Alka-Seltzer when you need to. When you've finished all your Alka-Seltzer, you can take the experiment a step further by tightly screwing on a bottle cap and tipping the bottle back and forth, what happens then?
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Will the Ice Melt and Overflow?
At first thought you might think that an ice cube sitting at the very top of a glass would eventually melt and spill over the sides but is this what really happens? Experiment and find out!
What you'll need:
A clear glass
Warm water
An ice cube
Instructions:
Fill the glass to the top with warm water.
Gently lower in the ice cube, making sure you don’t bump the table or spill any water over the edge of the glass.
Watch the water level carefully as the ice cube melts, what happens?
What's happening?
Even though the ice cube melted the water doesn’t overflow. When water freezes to make ice it expands and takes up more space than it does as liquid water (that’s why water pipes sometimes burst during cold winters). The water from the ice takes up less space than the ice itself. When the ice cube melts, the level of the water stays about the same.
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Test Your Dominant Side
Check out this cool experiment that will teach you more about how your body and brain work together. Test your dominant side by completing a series of challenges. Which hand do you write with? Which foot do you kick with? Do you have a dominant eye? Do you throw with one side of your body but kick with the other? Are you ambidextrous? Answer these questions and much more with this fun science experiment for kids.
What you'll need:
A pen or pencil
Paper or a notepad to write your findings on
An empty tube (an old paper towel tube is good)
A cup of water
A small ball (or something soft you can throw)
Instructions:
Write ‘left’ or ‘right’ next to each task depending on what side you used/favored.
When you’ve finished all the challenges review your results and make your own conclusions about which is your dominant eye, hand and foot.
Eye tests:
Which eye do you use to wink?
Which eye do you use to look through the empty tube?
Extend your arms in front of your body. Make a triangle shape using your fore fingers and thumbs. Bring your hands together, making the triangle smaller (about the size of a coin is good). Find a small object in the room and focus on it through the hole in your hands (using both eyes). Try closing just your left eye and then just your right, if your view of the object changed when you closed your left eye mark down ‘left’, if it changed when you closed your right eye mark down ‘right’.
Hand/Arm tests:
Which hand do you use to write?
Pick up the cup of water, which hand did you use?
Throw the ball, which arm did you use?
Foot/Leg tests:
Run forward and jump off one leg, which did you jump off?
Drop the ball on the ground and kick it, which foot did you use?
What's happening?
So what side do you favor? Are you left handed or right handed? Left footed or right footed? Is your right eye dominant or is it your left?
Around 90% of the world’s population is right handed. Why most people favor the right side is not completely understood by scientists. Some think that the reason is related to which side of your brain you use for language. The right side of your body is controlled by the left side of your brain, and in around 90% of people the left side of the brain also controls language.
Others think the reason might have more to do with culture. The word ‘right’ is associated being correct and doing the right thing while the word ‘left’ originally meant ‘weak’. Favoring the right hand may have become a social development as more children were taught important skills by right handed people and various tools were designed to be used with the right hand.
Around 80% of people are right footed and 70% favor their right eye. These percentages are lower than those who are right handed and this could be because your body has more freedom of choice in choosing its favored foot and eye than that of its favored hand. In other words you are more likely to be trained to use your right hand than your right foot and even more so than your right eye.
It’s not strange to find people who favor the opposite hand and foot (e.g. left hand and right foot), and some people are lucky enough to be ambidextrous, meaning they can use their left and right sides with equal skill.
Try testing others and coming to your on conclusions about what side the human body favors and why.
Extra: Are you more likely to be left handed if one of your parents is left handed? What are some of the possible disadvantages for left handed people? (Tools, writing materials etc) Do left handed people have an advantage in sports?
Interesting fact: In 2009, only 7% of the players in the NBA were left handed while in 2008 around 26% of MLB pitchers were left handed.
Is it better to be left handed in some sports than others? What do you think?
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Design and Test a Parachute
Learn about air resistance while making an awesome parachute! Design one that can fall slowly to the ground before putting it to the test, making modifications as you go.
What you'll need:
A plastic bag or light material
Scissors
String
A small object to act as the weight, a little action figure would be perfect
Instructions:
Cut out a large square from your plastic bag or material.
Trim the edges so it looks like an octagon (an eight sided shape).
Cut a small whole near the edge of each side.
Attach 8 pieces of string of the same length to each of the holes.
Tie the pieces of string to the object you are using as a weight.
Use a chair or find a high spot to drop your parachute and test how well it worked, remember that you want it to drop as slow as possible.
What's happening?
Hopefully your parachute will descend slowly to the ground, giving your weight a comfortable landing. When you release the parachute the weight pulls down on the strings and opens up a large surface area of material that uses air resistance to slow it down. The larger the surface area the more air resistance and the slower the parachute will drop.
Cutting a small hole in the middle of the parachute will allow air to slowly pass through it rather than spilling out over one side, this should help the parachute fall straighter.
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Make a Big Dry Ice Bubble
Have fun making a dry ice bubble that will grow and grow as it fills with fog. This experiment is a great one for adults to do with kids. Add water to the dry ice, cover it with a layer of soapy water and watch your bubble grow, how big will it get before it bursts? Give it a try and find out!
What you'll need:
Water
A large bowl with a lip around the top (a smaller bowl or cup will work too)
A strip of material or cloth
Soapy mixture for making bubbles (water and some dishwashing liquid should do the trick)
Dry ice - one piece for a cup, more for a bowl. Places where adults can buy dry ice include large grocery stores and Walmart. Butchers and ice cream stores might have some too.
Safety first! Be careful with dry ice as it can cause skin damage if not used safely. Adults should handle dry ice with gloves and avoid directly breathing in the vapor.
Instructions:
Place your dry ice in the bowl and add some water (it should start looking like a spooky cauldron).
Soak the material in your soapy mixture and run it around the lip of the bowl before dragging it across the top of the bowl to form a bubble layer over the dry ice.
Stand back and watch your bubble grow!
What's happening?
Dry ice is carbon dioxide (CO2) in its solid form. At temperatures above -56.4 °C (-69.5 °F), dry ice changes directly from a solid to a gas, without ever being a liquid. This process is called sublimation. When dry ice is put in water it accelerates the sublimation process, creating clouds of fog that fill up your dry ice bubble until the pressure becomes too much and the bubble explodes, spilling fog over the edge of the bowl. Dry ice is sometimes used as part of theater productions and performances to create a dense foggy effect. It is also used to preserve food, freeze lab samples and even to make ice cream!
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Make Lemonade Fizzy Drink
There's a lot of people out there that like drinking fizzy drinks, so why not do a fun science experiment that leaves you with your own lemon soda to drink afterwards!
A bit of lemon here and a bit of baking soda there and before you know it you'll be an expert at making your own fizzy drinks. Make your own lemonade softdrink with this fun experiment for kids.
What you'll need:
Lemon
Drinking glass
Water
1 teaspoon of baking soda
Some sugar to make it sweet
Instructions:
Squeeze as much of the juice from the lemon as you can into the glass.
Pour in an equal amount of water as lemon juice.
Stir in the teaspoon of baking soda.
Give the mixture a taste and add in some sugar if you think it needs to be sweeter.
What's happening?
The mixture you created should go bubbly and taste like a lemonade, soda, fizzy or soft drink, if you added some sugar it might even taste like a lemon flavoured soft drink you've bought at a store. The bubbles that form when you add the baking soda to the lemon mixture are carbon dioxide (CO2), these are the same bubbles you'll find in proper fizzy drinks. Of course they add a few other flavored sweeteners but it's not much different to what you made. If you are wondering how the carbon dioxide bubbles formed, it was because you created a chemical reaction when you added the lemon (an acid) to the baking soda (a base).
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Diet Coke & Mentos Eruption
One of the most popular experiments of modern times is the Diet Coke and Mentos Geyser. Made popular by Steve Spangler, this experiment is a lot of fun and sure to amaze your friends and family (assuming you do it outside rather than in the living room).
What you'll need:
Large bottle of Diet Coke
About half a pack of Mentos
Geyser tube (optional but makes things much easier)
Instructions:
Make sure you are doing this experiment in a place where you won't get in trouble for getting Diet Coke everywhere. Outside on some grass is perfect, please don't try this one in your family lounge!!
Stand the Diet Coke upright and unscrew the lid. Put some sort of funnel or tube on top of it so you can drop the Mentos in at the same time (about half the pack is a good amount). Doing this part can be tricky if you don't have a specially designed geyser tube, I recommend buying one from a local store such as Natures Discoveries (NZ) or online.
Time for the fun part, drop the Mentos into the Diet Coke and run like mad! If you've done it properly a huge geyser of Diet Coke should come flying out of the bottle, it's a very impressive sight. The record is about 9 metres (29 feet) high!
What's happening?
Although there are a few different theories around about how this experiment works, the most favoured reason is because of the combination of carbon dioxide in the Diet Coke and the little dimples found on Mentos candy pieces.
The thing that makes soda drinks bubbly is the carbon dioxide that is pumped in when they bottle the drink at the factory. It doesn't get released from the liquid until you pour it into a glass and drink it, some also gets released when you open the lid (more if you shake it up beforehand). This means that there is a whole lot of carbon dioxide gas just waiting to escape the liquid in the form of bubbles.
Dropping something into the Diet Coke speeds up this process by both breaking the surface tension of the liquid and also allowing bubbles to form on the surface area of the Mentos. Mentos candy pieces are covered in tiny dimples (a bit like a golf ball), which dramatically increases the surface area and allows a huge amount of bubbles to form.
The experiment works better with Diet Coke than other sodas due to its slightly different ingredients and the fact that it isn't so sticky. I also found that Diet Coke that had been bottled more recently worked better than older bottles that might have lost some of their fizz sitting on shop shelves for too long, just check the bottle for the date.
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Blowing Up Balloons With CO2
Chemical reactions make for some great experiments. Make use of the carbon dioxide given off by a baking soda and lemon juice reaction by funnelling the gas through a soft drink bottle and in to your awaiting balloon!
What you'll need:
Balloon
About 40 ml of water (a cup is about 250 ml so you don't need much)
Soft drink bottle
Drinking straw
Juice from a lemon
1 teaspoon of baking soda
Instructions:
Before you begin, make sure that you stretch out the balloon to make it as easy as possible to inflate.
Pour the 40 ml of water into the soft drink bottle.
Add the teaspoon of baking soda and stir it around with the straw until it has dissolved.
Pour the lemon juice in and quickly put the stretched balloon over the mouth of the bottle.
What's happening?
If all goes well then your balloon should inflate! Adding the lemon juice to the baking soda creates a chemical reaction. The baking soda is a base, while the lemon juice is an acid, when the two combine they create carbon dioxide (CO2). The gas rises up and escapes through the soft drink bottle, it doesn't however escape the balloon, pushing it outwards and blowing it up. If you don't have any lemons then you can substitute the lemon juice for vinegar.
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Make Your Own Fake Snot
As disgusting as it might sound to some people, let's make some fake snot! Snot actually serves an important purpose in our body so this experiment is not all about grossing out our friends, although that's certainly part of the fun.
What you'll need:
Boiling water (be careful with this)
A cup
Gelatin
Corn syrup
A teaspoon
A fork
Instructions:
Fill half a cup with boiling water.
Add three teaspoons of gelatin to the boiling water.
Let it soften before stirring with a fork.
Add a quarter of a cup of corn syrup.
Stir the mixture again with your fork and look at the long strands of gunk that have formed.
As the mixture cools slowly add more water, small amounts at a time.
What's happening?
Mucus is made mostly of sugars and protein. Although different than the ones found in the real thing, this is exactly what you used to make your fake snot. The long, fine strings you could see inside your fake snot when you moved it around are protein strands. These protein strands make snot sticky and capable of stretching.
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Make a Tornado in a Bottle
Learn how to make a tornado in a bottle with this fun science experiment for kids. Using easy to find items such as dish washing liquid, water, glitter and a bottle you can make your own mini tornado that’s a lot safer than one you might see on the weather channel. Follow the instructions and enjoy the cool water vortex you create!
What you'll need:
Water
A clear plastic bottle with a cap (that won't leak)
Glitter
Dish washing liquid
Instructions:
Fill the plastic bottle with water until it reaches around three quarters full.
Add a few drops of dish washing liquid.
Sprinkle in a few pinches of glitter (this will make your tornado easier to see).
Put the cap on tightly.
Turn the bottle upside down and hold it by the neck. Quickly spin the bottle in a circular motion for a few seconds, stop and look inside to see if you can see a mini tornado forming in the water. You might need to try it a few times before you get it working properly.
What's happening?
Spinning the bottle in a circular motion creates a water vortex that looks like a mini tornado. The water is rapidly spinning around the center of the vortex due to centripetal force (an inward force directing an object or fluid such as water towards the center of its circular path). Vortexes found in nature include tornadoes, hurricanes and waterspouts (a tornado that forms over water).
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Cut Ice Cubes in Half Like Magic
Speed up the melting process of ice with the help of a little pressure. Cut a piece of ice in half like magic while learning how the process relates to ice skating.
What you'll need:
One ice cube
A piece of fishing line with a weight (the heavier the better) tied to each end
A container
Some kind of tray to keep things from getting wet
Instructions:
Turn the container upside down and put it on the tray.
Place the ice cube on top of the upside down container.
Rest the fishing line over the ice cube so that the weights are left dangling over the side of the container.
Watch it for around 5 minutes.
What's happening?
The pressure from the two weights pulls the string through the ice cube by melting the ice directly under the fishing line. This is similar to ice skating where the blades of a skater melt the ice directly underneath, allowing the skater to move smoothly on a thin layer of water.
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Static Electricity Experiment
They say opposites attract and that couldn't be truer with these fun static electricity experiments. Find out about positively and negatively charged particles using a few basic items, can you control if they will be attracted or unattracted to each other?
What you'll need:
2 inflated balloons with string attached
Your hair
Aluminium can
Woolen fabric
Instructions:
Rub the 2 balloons one by one against the woolen fabric, then try moving the balloons together, do they want to or are they unattracted to each other?
Rub 1 of the balloons back and forth on your hair then slowly it pull it away, ask someone nearby what they can see or if there's nobody else around try looking in a mirror.
Put the aluminium can on its side on a table, after rubbing the balloon on your hair again hold the balloon close to the can and watch as it rolls towards it, slowly move the balloon away from the can and it will follow.
What's happening?
Rubbing the balloons against the woolen fabric or your hair creates static electricity. This involves negatively charged particles (electrons) jumping to positively charged objects. When you rub the balloons against your hair or the fabric they become negatively charged, they have taken some of the electrons from the hair/fabric and left them positively charged.
They say opposites attract and that is certainly the case in these experiments, your positively charged hair is attracted to the negatively charged balloon and starts to rise up to meet it. This is similar to the aluminium can which is drawn to the negatively charged balloon as the area near it becomes positively charged, once again opposites attract.
In the first experiment both the balloons were negatively charged after rubbing them against the woolen fabric, because of this they were unattracted to each other.
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Does an Orange Float or Sink?
Does an orange float or sink when placed in water? Seems like a fairly straight forward question, but is it? Give this fun density science experiment for kids a try and answer the question while learning a unique characteristic of oranges.
What you'll need:
An orange
A deep bowl or container
Water
Instructions:
Fill the bowl with water.
Put the orange in the water and watch what happens.
Peel the rind from the orange and try the experiment again, what happens this time?
What's happening?
The first time you put the orange in the bowl of water it probably floated on the surface, after you removed the rind however, it probably sunk to the bottom, why?
The rind of an orange is full of tiny air pockets which help give it a lower density than water, making it float to the surface. Removing the rind (and all the air pockets) from the orange increases its density higher than that of water, making it sink.
Density is the mass of an object relative to its volume. Objects with a lot of matter in a certain volume have a high density, while objects with a small amount of matter in the same volume have a low density.
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What Absorbs More Heat?
When you're out in the sun on a hot summers day it pays to wear some light colored clothes, but why is that? Experiment with light, color, heat and some water to find out.
What you'll need:
2 identical drinking glasses or jars
Water
Thermometer
2 elastic bands or some sellotape
White paper
Black paper
Instructions:
Wrap the white paper around one of the glasses using an elastic band or sellotape to hold it on.
Do the same with the black paper and the other glass.
Fill the glasses with the exact same amount of water.
Leave the glasses out in the sun for a couple of hours before returning to measure the temperature of the water in each.
What's happening?
Dark surfaces such as the black paper absorb more light and heat than the lighter ones such as the white paper. After measuring the temperatures of the water, the glass with the black paper around it should be hotter than the other. Lighter surfaces reflect more light, that's why people where lighter colored clothes in the summer, it keeps them cooler.
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Water Molecules on the Move
This experiment is great for testing if hot water molecules really move faster than cold ones. Pour some water, drop in some food coloring and compare results.
What you'll need:
A clear glass filled with hot water
A clear glass filled with cold water
Food coloring
An eye dropper
Instructions:
Fill the glasses with the same amount of water, one cold and one hot.
Put one drop of food coloring into both glasses as quickly as possible.
Watch what happens to the food colouring.
What's happening?
If you watch closely you will notice that the food coloring spreads faster throughout the hot water than in the cold. The molecules in the hot water move at a faster rate, spreading the food coloring faster than the cold water molecules which mover slower.
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Plant Seeds & Watch Them Grow
Learn about seed germination with this fun science experiment for kids. Plant some seeds and follow the growth of the seedlings as they sprout from the soil while making sure to take proper care of them with just the right amount of light, heat and water. Have fun growing plants with this cool science project for children.
What you'll need:
Fresh seeds of your choice such as pumpkins seeds, sunflower seeds, lima beans or pinto beans.
Good quality soil (loose, aerated, lots of peat moss), if you don’t have any you can buy some potting soil at your local garden store.
A container to hold the soil and your seeds.
Water.
Light and heat.
Instructions:
Fill the container with soil.
Plant the seeds inside the soil.
Place the container somewhere warm, sunlight is good but try to avoid too much direct sunlight, a window sill is a good spot.
Keep the soil moist by watering it everyday (be careful not to use too much water).
Record your observations as the seeds germinate and seedlings begin to sprout from the seeds.
What's happening?
Hopefully after a week of looking after them, your seedlings will be on their way. Germination is the process of a plant emerging from a seed and beginning to grow. For seedlings to grow properly from a seed they need the right conditions. Water and oxygen are required for seeds to germinate. Many seeds germinate at a temperature just above normal room temperature but others respond better to warmer temperatures, cooler temperatures or even changes in temperature. While light can be an important trigger for germination, some seeds actually need darkness to germinate, if you buy seeds it should mention the requirements for that specific type of seed in the instructions.
Continue to look after your seedlings and monitor their growth. For further experiments you could compare the growth rates of different types of seeds or the effect of different conditions on their growth.
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Taste Testing Without Smell
We all know that some foods taste better than others but what gives us the ability to experience all these unique flavours? This simple experiment shows that there's a lot more to taste than you might have first thought.
What you'll need:
A small piece of peeled potato
A small piece of peeled apple (same shape as the potato so you can't tell the difference)
Instructions:
Close your eyes and mix up the piece of potato and the piece of apple so you don't know which is which.
Hold your nose and eat each piece, can you tell the difference?
What's happening?
Holding your nose while tasting the potato and apple makes it hard to tell the difference between the two. Your nose and mouth are connected through the same airway which means that you taste and smell foods at the same time. Your sense of taste can recognize salty, sweet, bitter and sour but when you combine this with your sense of smell you can recognize many other individual 'tastes'. Take away your smell (and sight) and you limit your brains ability to tell the difference between certain foods.
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Escaping Water
Water can certainly move in mysterious ways, get the water from one cup to make its way up hill and back down into a second empty cup with the help of paper towels and an interesting scientific process.
What you'll need:
A glass of water
An empty glass
Some paper towels
Instructions:
Twist a couple of pieces of paper towel together until it forms something that looks a little like a piece of rope, this will be the 'wick' that will absorb and transfer the water (a bit like the wick on a candle transferring the wax to the flame).
Place one end of the paper towels into the glass filled with water and the other into the empty glass.
Watch what happens (this experiment takes a little bit of patience).
What's happening?
Your paper towel rope (or wick) starts getting wet, after a few minutes you will notice that the empty glass is starting to fill with water, it keeps filling until there is an even amount of water in each glass, how does this happen?
This process is called 'capillary action', the water uses this process to move along the tiny gaps in the fibre of the paper towels. It occurs due to the adhesive force between the water and the paper towel being stronger than the cohesive forces inside the water itself. This process can also be seen in plants where moisture travels from the roots to the rest of the plant.
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Microscopic Creatures in Water
Water can be home to a lot of interesting creatures and microorganisms, especially if it's dirty water found in ponds or near plants. Take some samples, view them under a microscope and see what you can find. How clean is the water from your tap compared to the water found in a pond? Experiment and see what kind of microscopic creatures you can find!
What you'll need:
A concave slide
A dropper
A microscope
Different samples of water (tap water, pond water, muddy water etc). Near plants or in the mud are good places to take samples as they usually contain more microorganisms.
Instructions:
Set up you microscope, preferably using its highest setting.
Use the dropper to take some water from one of your samples and put it on the concave slide. Focus the microscope, what can you see? Be patient if you can't see anything. If you still can't see anything and have checked that you are in focus, try a different water sample.
Look at how the creatures move. After observing their movements you might like to record their behaviors and draw them.
What are you looking at?
Some of the creatures and microorganisms you might be able to see include:
Euglenas - These are between a plant and an animal, they have a long tail called a flagellum which allows them to move.
Protozoa - They have a flagella (tail) which can be hard to see, the difference between protozoa and algae is often hard to define.
Amoebas - These microorganisms swim by wobbling. They also surround their food like a blob in order to eat it.
Algae - Not considered to be plants by most scientists, these organisms might be colored yellowish, greenish or reddish. They may also be found by themselves or in chains.
There might even my larger creatures such as worms or brine shrimp in your water samples, depending on where you took them from.
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Bend a Straw with Your Eyes
Using the power of your eyes, bend a straw sitting in half a glass of water without even touching it! It sounds like magic but it's really another amazing scientific principle at work.
What you'll need:
A glass half filled with water
A straw
2 eyes (preferably yours)
Instructions:
Look at the straw from the top and bottom of the glass.
Look at the straw from the side of the glass, focus on the point where the straw enters the water, what is strange about what you see?
What's happening?
Our eyes are using light to see various objects all the time, but when this light travels through different mediums (such as water & air) it changes direction slightly. Light refracts (or bends) when it passes from water to air. The straw looks bent because you are seeing the bottom part through the water and air but the top part through the air only. Air has a refractive index of around 1.0003 while water has a refractive index of about 1.33.
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Egg Bubbles
This fun science experiment for kids focuses on some of the interesting characteristics of eggs. Prove the existence of a small air pocket inside an egg as well as thousands of small holes in the shell called pores, while learning what air does as it is heated.
What you'll need:
A clear glass or jar
Hot water (adult supervision is a good idea when using hot water)
An egg
A magnifying glass
Instructions:
Place the egg carefully into the glass or jar.
Carefully pour hot water into the glass or jar until it is nearly full.
Leave the glass or jar on a table or flat surface and watch the egg closely for a few minutes (the glass may become hot so be careful).
Use your magnifying glass to closely examine what is happening.
What's happening?
After surrounding the egg with hot water you will notice tiny bubbles forming on the egg shell which eventually bubble their way to the surface.
An egg contains a small air pocket at its larger end between the shell and egg white. When the air trapped inside this small pocket begins to heat up it expands and tries to find a way out of the shell, but how does it escape?
They're too small to see under normal conditions but with the help of a magnifying glass you can see that egg shells contain thousands of small holes called pores (human skin has pores too).
The pores allow air to pass through the shell, making it look like the egg is breathing as the air expands and is forced through the shell.
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Make Your Own Rainbow
Learn how to make a rainbow with this fun science experiment for kids. Using just a few simple everyday items you can find out how rainbows work while enjoying an interactive, hands on activity that’s perfect for kids.
What you'll need:
A glass of water (about three quarters full)
White paper
A sunny day
Instructions:
Take the glass of water and paper to a part of the room with sunlight (near a window is good).
Hold the glass of water (being careful not to spill it) above the paper and watch as sunlight passes through the glass of water, refracts (bends) and forms a rainbow of colors on your sheet of paper.
Try holding the glass of water at different heights and angles to see if it has a different effect.
What's happening?
While you normally see a rainbow as an arc of color in the sky, they can also form in other situations. You may have seen a rainbow in a water fountain or in the mist of a waterfall and you can even make your own such as you did in this experiment.
Rainbows form in the sky when sunlight refracts (bends) as it passes through raindrops, it acts in the same way when it passes through your glass of water. The sunlight refracts, separating it into the colors red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo and violet.
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Warm Air Needs More Room
As its temperature rises, air starts to act a little differently. Find out what happens to a balloon when the air inside it heats up with this fun science experiment for kids.
What you'll need:
Empty bottle
Balloon
Pot of hot water (not boiling)
Instructions:
Stretch the balloon over the mouth of the empty bottle.
Put the bottle in the pot of hot water, let it stand for a few minutes and watch what happens.
What's happening?
As the air inside the balloon heats up it starts to expand. The molecules begin to move faster and further apart from each other. This is what makes the balloon stretch. There is still the same amount of air inside the balloon and bottle, it has just expanded as it heats up.
Warm air therefore takes up more space than the same amount of cold air, it also weighs less than cold air occupying the same space. You might have seen this principle in action if you've flown in or watched a hot air balloon.