If you’re staying home at the moment, you can introduce your child to a few stimulating science activities for kids at home that will inspire curiosity for the world and get their brains working.
These four science activities are ideal for teachers and parents who have limited resources. They’re super easy to set up, tidy, and engaging enough to keep kids entertained. Use these activities to introduce new concepts to your children, like why soap cleans our hands and how evaporation and condensation works.
1. Rainbow jar
A rainbow jar relies on substances that won’t mix, to stay in their dedicated colour segmentations. The ooey-gooey consistency is quite mesmerising, and children will spend a significant amount of time putting this together. The experiment is safe, easy, and the results are quite beautiful. Choose a decorative jar in case the kids want to hold onto the rainbow jar.
What you need:
- Tall Glass Jar
- Food Colouring: Red, Blue and Green
- 1/4 cup Honey
- 1/4 cup Blue Dish Soap
- 1/4 cup Water
- 1/4 cup Olive Oil
- 1/4 cup Rubbing Alcohol
- Jars for mixing and pouring
- Teaspoons for mixing
How you do it
Start with the bottom colour, purple. Mix red and blue food colourant with ¼ cup of honey to make a thick purple solution. Pour it into the jar. Next, add blue – blue dish soap works perfectly, pour it straight over the purple solution in the jar. For green, you only need a drop of green colourant added to ¼ cup of water and add it to the rainbow jar. Prevent the water from penetrating the other layers by trickling it down the side of the jar. For yellow, add olive oil. Give the green a chance to settle first and then pour the olive as slowly and carefully as you did the green. Add a few drops of red colourant to ¼ cup of rubbing alcohol and again, pour the red slowly down the sides of the jar. Always pour the layers slowly to prevent them from mixing.
2. Leak-proof bag
Science activities for kids at home: let your child be amazed by this cool science activity! | Photo: Fun Learning For Kids.
As if stabbing a bag of water isn’t thrilling enough, older children will understand how amazing it is that there is no water leaking from the bag. Younger children will enjoy using a sharp pencil to pierce the bag.
What you need:
- Storage Bag
- Sharpened Pencils
How you do it
Fill a clear bag with water. You can make it more interesting by adding colourant to the water, but be sure to have your experiment in an area that can get wet. The point of the experiment is that the bag won’t leak but these activities can progress and lead to other activities, which can cause spills. Suspend the bag of water and run a sharp pencil through the plastic of the bag and out again. Children will enjoy it, and it is suitable for those as young as three or four years old. Supervise the game as there are sharp pencils.
3. Milk art
Science activities for kids at home: super pretty to look at and fun to make as well! | Photo: Momtastic.
This activity can be used as a sensory experiment for younger children or an opportunity to exercise artistic flair in older children. It’s also super entertaining and educational. If you’re worried about the mess do it outdoors, but it generally stays fairly simple and contained without too much effort.
What you need:
- Whole Milk (NOT low fat or skim)
- Pan
- Food Colouring Kit
- Dish Soap
- 1 Adorable Child
How you do it
There are two ways to enjoy this creative experiment. For both, start by pouring the milk into a shallow dish or a pan. Next, add some food colourant (just drop the blobs of various colours each in one place). Now you can either drop in blobs of dish soap or, you can take a toothpick and dip it in dish soap. If you drop the dish soap straight in, you will see the colours dance beautifully together, mixing and swirling each time you add more dish soap. If you use a toothpick, you can actually manipulate the colours; the toothpick will be like a magic wand, repelling the food colourant. This experiment is an easy way to demonstrate how soap chases away germs and why it is important to use soap when we wash our hands.
4. Make it rain
This activity is super entertaining and it also demonstrates to children how the process that leads up to precipitation (rain) actually works. The bonus is that it’s easy to set up and it’s virtually mess-free. Plus, your kids might decide to keep themselves entertained by redoing it over and over once they have mastered the technique the first time.
What you need:
- Glass Canning Jar
- Ceramic Plate
- Hot Water (parental guidance with this part)
- 4 Ice Cubes
How to do it
First, place enough hot water in the jar to reach about 5cm in height and secure the lid of the jar with the ceramic plate. Next, wait a few minutes – three to five minutes should do it – and then start the next part. Place your four ice cubes on the ceramic plate and watch as droplets form and turn into rain. Explain the process of evaporation and condensation to your children. You can change up the experiment if you want to stimulate more questions. Swap out the ceramic plate for a paper plate and discuss why the experiment doesn’t work as well (talk about how absorbable paper is).
Street Science offers exciting and engaging stage shows as well as thoughtfully designed hands-on workshops. These workshops complement the Australian National Curriculum. Based in Brisbane, Street Science engages intensively with schools and communities along the East Coast of Australia, as well as servicing other major cities, regional districts and international audiences. Their experienced science communicators mix humour, exciting demonstrations and quality scientific explanations into an interactive science experience to be enjoyed by all ages.
This article was first published on Kidspot and republished on theAsianparent with permission.
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