Acids and Bases

 This week was all about acids and bases. We had a blast with these three activities in particular:

1. Making Dull Pennies Shine

Need: dull pennies, lemon juice, lime juice, baking soda, water, tray, index cards to label, and cups

-Have child fill the cups with water, baking soda, lemon, and lime

-ask which one they think will clean the pennies

-add a couple of pennies to each cup

-wait 10-15 minutes

-discuss what worked and what didn't

(the lime and lemons, i.e. the acids, should make the dull pennies the shiniest. baking soda and water shouldn't do anything)

2. Adding Vinegar to Baking Soda

Need: water, vinegar, ice cube tray, baking soda and/or baking powder, transferring tools (a spoon and dropper work well), index cards to label

Directions: Have child add baking soda to each ice cube tray. Allow them to try different liquids and see what happens. Add baking powder to a few and see if there is any difference in the reactions. Talk about what happened. 

Extra to discuss: We learned that Baking Soda is considered a base and that Vinegar is an acid. We also learned that water is in the middle. Finally, when you add an acid and a base the result is a chemical reaction. (those were all new words for this week)

3. Building a Volcano

We cheated a little bit for this one and splurged on a volcano making kit from the craft store. I think in the end it was worth the couple of extra dollars...it included everything except for the baking powder and the vinegar. You can see in the picture that Bear wanted to have a cave for the animals so we left part of it open.


Linking up this week:
Living Montessori Now
TGIF Linky Party
Thrifty Thursday #8