Growing at Home - Science!

Have you ever done the egg drop challenge? This is an all time favorite science project for most high schoolers, but younger kids can have fun with this too! The idea is to design a system that will protect your egg from breaking from a high fall. You can use any household items to build this (though bubble wrap is discouraged). Buggy and Buddy have developed some free handouts to walk you through the process. One of these is a recording sheet where you can keep track of whether or not you thought the contraption would protect the egg and what ended up happening, Click here to Download.

Have fun designing your own device, be as creative as your mind can take you, and discover the strong and weak points in your designs!

Explosions!!!

Things that blow up are essential for fun learning, which is proven in every movie ever about kids exploring science. A safe way to cause an explosion is to create a volcano. That's right, send the kids outside, let them dig up your yard a bit and build their own miniature volcano. Have them do some research to understand what volcanoes are and how they form. To create the exploding lava they'll need:

• Some dirt (or clay or sand, etc.) that they've shaped into a compact volcano

• A small bowl or container to put inside the volcano

• Baking Soda

• Liquid Dish Soap

• Vinegar

• Food Coloring (optional but preferred)

Directions: Put the container inside your built volcano (we cut off the top of a water bottle and placed it on top of our small container, but that is optional). Add 2 spoonfuls of baking soda, add a spoonful of dish soap, and about 10 drops of food coloring. To create the eruption, add your vinegar and stand back!

Feel free to add extra amounts of all ingredients to create more lava. ScienceBob has some suggestions on different experiments you can try with your volcano. For example, what could you add to your lava mixture to slow down the speed of the lava?

Variations: We can't have only one explosion! Another version is elephant toothpaste, which will require some hydrogen peroxide and dry yeast. An all time classic option that requires very few ingredients, is Mentos mixed with Diet Coke.

Silly Putty

I know we're all tired of the slime craze, but here's a new twist! Smart School House explains how you can make silly putty just by mixing 1.5 Tbsp dish soap and 2 Tbsp corn starch. Silly Putty is not sticky and can be formed into fun, creative shapes.

For more fun science projects you can do together as a family, Steve Spangler is doing one new science project a day for 50 days for free, specifically for kids. Check out his site and have fun learning!

Please let us know what other kinds of topics you would enjoy learning about with your family. We love you and will talk to you more soon!