Science Fun with Snow & Ice!

We've been having lots of fun with snow & ice @ the library--and learning important early literacy skills along the way!

Toddlers painted blocks of ice using watercolors in only the primary colors. They saw first hand what happens when these colors mix--and they observed what happens to ice at room temperature. They also made many prints of their work--just pressed white paper down on top of the painted ice. The ice kept changing as they painted and it melted--so many made lots of prints. Later older kids--and teens--had a great time painting and printing blocks of ice.

 

 Just freeze blocks of ice in containers for several hours. Turn the containers upside down and run them under warm water for a few seconds. The ice block pops right out--and the fun & learning can begin!

While there is still so much snow, explore some its properties. Make a small snowball and ask--will it float or sink? Then try it. There were many surprised scientists at the library when we offered this activity for STEAM Friday. (Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts, Math--every Fri. @ the library!)

Which takes up more space--snow or water--or are they the same? Make a prediction (your hypothesis) and then conduct the experiment. Fill two identical cups to the same level--one with water and one with snow. Once the snow has melted, what do you observe? Was your hypothesis correct? It doesn't matter--what matters is that you followed the Scientific Method--make a hypothesis, conduct the experiment, observe, draw a conclusion.

Have fun with The Snowy Day by Ezra Jack Keats. This year is the 53rd anniversary of this sweet award winning classic for young children. We made snow tracks on dark paper using 'snow paint' we made. It just takes equal parts flour, salt, and water. Mix it together and then paint tracks in the snow like the ones in the book. When it dries, it glitters and really does look like snow! So easy--and a great measuring activity! Check out some more ideas to use with this fantastic book at Ready-Set-Read, http://www.ready-set-read.com/2013/01/the-snowy-day-book-activities.html

 When you explore science, math and the world all around, you are helping your child get ready to read. Studies show that the more your child knows about his world--and the more vocabulary he learns as a result, the more successful he or she will be when he begins to read!

Preschool STEAM: Windy Days @ the Library

The weather is finally starting to look up a little, but with that comes the windy days of March! Last week our 4 and 5 year olds enjoyed stories and activities about wind. Here are 2 of the books we enjoyed:

Huff & puff  by Claudia Rueda
Children play the part of the Big, Bad Wolf in this fun book. They enjoy the surprise ending!

The wind blew by Pat Hutchins
The wind creates a mess as it blows away all sorts of items!

Instead of our normal movie and craft, the children were able to choose from several STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Art and Math) activities.

This was probably the most popular station. We had 2 buckets set up, one with icy water and one with hot tap water. The children placed a small plastic pop bottle with a balloon on top into the cold water and then into the hot water to see what would happen. They were amazed when the balloon would stand up in the hot water and collapse in the cold. I think they would have stayed at this one the whole time if we hadn't encouraged them to try the other activities.



A couple of thoughts if you want to do this at home: The more extreme the hot and cold are, the better it seems to work.

If you blow up the balloon, or really stretch it out, before you put it on the bottle, it seems to work better.

 A simple one: We had a bowl full of water and some foam cut out shapes for the children to float like little boats. Then we had them blow with straws to create wind on their "lake." It didn't take long before they were blowing into the water as hard as they could. But then, that's just more experimenting with wind, right?



We did have a garbage can right next to this one so that they could throw away the straws as soon as they were finished.

We made pinwheels for our art activity. I had a fan set up on one of the tables that the children could use to test out the pinwheels. We also had streamer sticks, feathers and scarves that they could use. Again we saw amazement when the children watched the pinwheels spin wildly.

It took a little experimenting to find the spots that would blow best and how far to stand from the fan. There were some spots that didn't blow at all, where some would go crazy. And yes, I did tell the children not to touch the fan. I also had it set back far enough on the table that they couldn't touch it easily.

STEAM Away the Cold!

This week @ the library we are STEAMing (activities in Science, Technology, Engineering, Art, & Math) about snow!

•  Look at snow through a magnifying glass. What do you see? 
• Which melts snow more quickly, salt, flour, or water? What happens when you put the melted snow back outside? 
• Paint snow with eyedroppers of water color. What happens as the snow melts?
•  Learn about snowflakes, then make one of your own. 
• Blow bubbles outside. What happens? So much to learn, so much to see! 

You can do these things at home too! Here's a great one for days like today & tomorrow:

• Go outside with your budding scientist (very briefly) and blow bubbles. No bottle of bubbles? Make some with water and dish soap. If you have a choice, Joy or Dawn are best. But any type will work. Then you need something to blow with. Pipe cleaners or thin wire or anything else that can be rounded into one shape will work. So will paper tubes! Dip the bubble blower into the solution, blow, and watch what happens. 
• If you don't mind, let your young scientist blow some bubbles inside. What's the difference between the bubbles you blow outside and those you blow inside? Why? 
• Try blowing a bubble onto a plate and set the plate outside. What happens to the bubble?

Want to learn about all this? Check out the Canada Science Technology Museum for a great explanation, picture, and a bubble solution recipe! (That's about 1/2 cup dish soap, 1/2 cup corn syrup, and 3 cups water. You don't have to have corn syrup--it may make the bubbles last longer--but so will the cold! And I didn't use corn syrup or hot water, but my results were the same.)
Check out the library's Facebook page for another fun cold weather activity.

National Library Card Month!

The library has been a busy place this month! This month we've started focusing more on STEAM, which is Science, Technology, Engineering, Art and Math. Every Friday we've had activities relating to the Giant Squid and the ocean. And we did some experimenting with our Preschoolers with sinking and floating.

Here's a little peek at what's been happening:

Have you visited the library this month? Has your child showed us his or her library card? Remember... children can pick a prize and be entered into a drawing for a Target gift card through the end of September - just by showing that they're cool kids with a library card!

More Math and Science!

This is the last list, but by no means the end of the books we have at the library! Please ask if you want more books for your child!

First, though, we have a couple of pictures from the Math and Science Workshop we did August 21st.

 After reading Jump, Frog, Jump!, each child jumped as far as they could. We used yarn to measure how far each child jumped and then lined up each piece of yarn to talk about the differences in lengths.

You could use yarn, toy cars, crayons or even potatoes to measure things at home. For example, how many cars long is the kitchen table?

This is another simple activity that you could do at home.

We had a bowl of water and various objects from around the house and yard. Each child was given an object and asked to predict whether it would sink or float. After they tested their hypothesis, the children put their object in the water to see what would happen. Then we talked about the results. Do you think the pine cone in the picture would sink or float?

Here are some more books that involve Math and Science. Please read some nonfiction with your children. The schools are starting to adopt the national Common Core standards for their curriculum and one requirement will be that the children be able to read and write much more in the nonfiction, informational text. Becoming familiar with nonfiction books now will greatly help them later! And you don't have to read everything word for word. Stop and talk about what you are reading and the pictures. Make it fun and read what your children are interested in!

Actual Size by Steve Jenkins

Bear Wants More by Karma Wilson

Big Babies, Little Babies by Lorrie Mack

Butterfly by Mary Ling

Butterfly Eyes and Other Secrets of the Meadow by Joyce Sidman

The Cloud Book by Tomie de Paola

Edwina, the Dinosaur Who Didn't Know She Was Extinct by Mo Willems

An Egg is Quiet by Dianna Aston

I Face the Wind by Vicki Cobb

It Looked Like Spilt Milk

The Journey of a Butterfly by Carolyn Scrace

Living Color by Steve Jenkins

Looking Closely Through the Forest by Frank Serafini

On One Flower : Butterflies, Ticks and a Few More Icks by Anthony D. Fredericks

The Shape Song Swingalong by Stevesongs

Nic Bishop Spiders by Nic Bishop