Saturday, April 27, 2013

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Burping Bags (an Exploding Science Experiment!)



Burping bags, or exploding bags, is another fun science experiment with vinegar and baking soda!  You can use it as an excellent science activity by itself, an application in color mixing, a sensory experience, or as a writing prompt.  This science project is great fun for toddlers, preschoolers, and older children too!  My kindergartener's journal entry for this day read, "Today, I made a bag pop."

The burping bag (aka the exploding bag) is made when you mix baking soda and vinegar inside the sealed bag.  As they react, carbon dioxide is released.  This gas builds up inside the bag, until it breaks out with a fabulous little "POP!"

Burping bags (or Exploding Bags)

Simple Supplies
  • 1/3 cup vinegar
  • 1/4 cup warm water
  • quart sized sandwich baggies
  • 2 tablespoons baking soda
  • 1-ply paper towels
  • food coloring
  • glitter, cake sprinkles, etc.

Easy How-to:

1- Wrap the baking soda into a little paper towel pouch.  Mix the vinegar and warm water together.  (The vinegar/water ratio is not too critical.  You want more vinegar than water.  The warm water speeds up the reaction.)

2- Let your child place food coloring, sprinkles, and other experimental variables into the baggie.  My kids each loved making their own baggie!



3- Add the vinegar/water to the baggie.  Watch how it changes color when it hits the food coloring!

4- Carefully place the baking soda packet inside the baggie and zip it up without getting the baking soda wet.  This is a little tricky, but you can do it!  Make sure you have a tight seal on the zippy!



5- Let your child give it a quick shake and set it on the ground!  It will begin to fill with carbon dioxide quickly, and your children will want to touch it!  Let them...it's okay!


If you can manage to the bag down upright, your explosion may leave a little of the mixture in the baggie after it pops.  If this happens, zip it back up, and let your child squish it, shake it, and play with it!




Even when it explodes everywhere, you can let them play in it!







For more science project fun, check out my collection of over 150 preschool science experiments!  They're great for older kid science too!!


Happy Educating, Carla




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Thursday, April 25, 2013

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{FREE} Mother's Day Printable at B-Inspired Mama

Check out this {FREE} Mother's Day printable I made for B-Inspired Mama today!  It would be fun to fill out with your children, or help them fill it out for Grandma.  Hop on over to B-Inspired Mama and grab yours today!!






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Tuesday, April 23, 2013

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3000 Facebook Followers Celebration Giveaway Event!!

I have been promising my Facebook followers a celebration event to thank them for joining me at www.Facebook.com/PreschoolPowolPackets, and I am so, so excited to host it here at Preschool Powol Packets!  I have contacted some amazing craftsmen and women and am so excited to share their work with you.  All of the giveaway items are perfect for preschoolers, and I'm sure any of you would be thrilled with these prizes!!




Entering is easy, and I will explain all the directions below.  First, I want to introduce you to the four amazing artisans who are sponsoring this event.  Their work is unique and high quality, and I'd encourage you to visit their shops and consider purchasing some of their other products. 

Jim Aro at Aroswoodcrafts makes eco-friendly hand-crafted wooden children's toys (and more!) from reclaimed wood.  Check out his Etsy shop here!  He will be providing this eco-friendly children's wooden dump truck!  Kids will love the rolling wheels and a hinged dumping mechanism, and parents will love the fact that Jim uses certified non-toxic varnish and non-toxic glue!  



Yana at ArtGiftStore makes eco-friendly wooden toys, games, and puzzles for children. Check out her Etsy shop here!  She will be providing this bright and friendly wooden elephant puzzle!  Children will love the appeal of the colorful, cute elephants as they strengthen fine motor skills and improve their problem solving ability with this adorable puzzle! 





Jen at Storybook Blocks makes natural wood blocks based on your children's favorite stories!  Check out her Etsy shop here!  She will be providing this wonderful block set based on The Very Hungry Caterpillar!  These beautiful and familiar images are a fabulous way to practice sequencing, retelling, and creating new stories and twists on originals.  They are also fabulous for fine motor skills and stacking!



Megan at Hair Accessories by Megan creates adorable clips and headbands for little girls and babies!  Check out her Etsy shop here!  She will be providing a set of three Shabby Chic Flower Clips in your choice of colors!  She uses no-slip grips and has gorgeous colors.  Your little girl will be thrilled to get these in the mail!


And now for the giveaway details!  Simply use the Rafflecopter form below to enter!  The giveaway will be open until midnight on May 2nd.  Rafflecopter will draw four random winners.  The first place winner will have his/her first choice of prize.  The second place winner will have second priority, and so on.  I will contact the winners by email.  Because there are four amazing prizes available, it is critical that winners respond to my email as soon as possible.  If you do not respond within 24 hours, you will forfeit the prize and I will draw a new winner.  Please take a moment and make sure my email (preschoolpackets@gmail.com) is white-listed in your email (so it doesn't go to your spam folder).  Also, please note that entrants are limited to the continental United States.  I love the rest of you too, but shipping is pricey!  If you have any questions, feel free to email me!  Good luck!!

A Quick Note:  The first entry is to follow me on Facebook since the whole motivation for this event was to say "Thank You" to my wonderful supporters on Facebook!  If you're not there yet, it's okay...you can still "like" and join in!


a Rafflecopter giveaway








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Friday, April 19, 2013

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{FREE} Ladybug Math Activity!!



Make 10 spots on the ladybug! 

This fun math activity lets your children practice counting, adding, and puzzle skills all at once!  It is great for individual practice, homeschool, centers, or whole groups!

 
To use, cut out the pieces and encourage your children to create ladybugs with ten spots.  Then, let your children record the equations they make on the recording sheet.  Younger children will enjoy building the ladybugs and counting the dots they make.


This activity is one of sixteen recommended activities in my Ladybug Unit.  Click here for more information about the complete ladybug unit!

And if you're looking for more insect or bug resources, check out these other FREE insect, bug, and spider printables:



Happy Educating, Carla!
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Thursday, April 18, 2013

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5 Excellent Plants to Grow With Kids & An Object Lesson!




Growing a garden, or even just a few plants, with children makes the spring come alive in ways few other things do.  Gardens are also wonderful Earth Day projects!  (Click here for 30 fun Earth Day Ideas!)  Children love to watch the plants sprout, grow, and flower, but they can become anxious if nothing changes for a couple weeks.  Here are five plants that grow and change quickly, making them educational and loads of fun!

Make sure you read all the way to the end for a great character development object lesson from your garden!

#1: Garlic:

Cloves of garlic will sprout if you leave them in your fridge or pantry too long.  Plant the clove such that the green sprout is just exposed to sunlight.  In about a week, the garlic plant can grow several inches!  Garlic does great in full sun or partial shade.  You can snip the green part off to give a mild garlic flavor to stirfrys and other meals!



#2: Oregano:

Oregano is easy to plant because many nurseries and grocery stores sell young starts in Earth-friendly containers.  It does best with 4-6 hours of direct, bright sunlight.  Children love snipping bits of it off and adding it in to spaghetti, lasagna, other pastas, stirfrys, and more!




#3:  Squash: 


Yellow squash and zucchini plants do best with at least 5 hours of bright, direct sunlight and lots of water.  It is easy to find little packs of 4-6 starts for under $2.00 in the Spring.  Kids love to pinch out the starts and bury them in small holes.  They also love how fast the flowers show up...usually only a couple weeks!  During that time, they can watch the leaves grow and the plant quickly take up lots of space.



#4:  Flowers:

Some flowers are better for children than others.  Alyssum and marigolds both come in a variety of colors and tend to make lots of flowers...which your sweet children will love to pick and bring to you!  It is almost too hot in Houston for alyssum now, but marigolds will thrive all summer long.  If you do not remove the dead-heads, marigolds will also re-plant themselves!




#5:  Peas:


I saved one of the best for last!  Peas grow quickly and are amazing in so many ways.  The seeds are big enough that your kids' small hands can still work with them easily.  They love bright sunshine, but will still grow if they only get five (or so) hours of direct light.  The tall peas in this picture were planted from seed only three weeks earlier.  If you look closely, you can see a shorter row of peas that are only two weeks old.  Peas need string or a trellis to grow up.  If you look closely, you can see their small tendrils wrapping around the string and other plants.  This leads to one of my favorite gardening object lessons.

Peas can help each other grow.  Look at the picture below...they're holding hands!  As the pea plants lift each other, they strengthen themselves too!  Let's encourage our children to help each other and be good friends...as they do so, they themselves will become better people too!









Happy Educating, Carla

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Tuesday, April 16, 2013

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Bubbly Brew Science Experiment



We love science experiments--especially ones that bubble, fizz, and "explode!"  I love it even more when the children are in charge--they learn so much more from hypothesizing, planning, and experimenting.  This bubbly fountain of a science project came from my kids, so today I'm going to share their creative process.

It began with this balloon experiment:


When we finish something like this, I always ask the kids, "What would you like to test next?"  They wanted to add bubbles to vinegar and baking soda.  My daughter grabbed a bottle of bubbles, and instructed me to add it until it took up about 1/3 of the water bottle.  Then we added about 1/4 more vinegar, and 2 tablespoons baking soda.  This was the amazing result:




The kids wanted to do one more experiment...with color!   We ended up "exploding" the experiment at least three more times.  Each time, a different child added a drop or two (or as little as their small hands could manage) of food coloring.  The colors swirled, and pretty soon, we had all this:









Of course, they needed spoons and fingers to really experience the experiment!  The beautiful part of this experiment is that it is completely non-toxic.  I wouldn't recommend letting children eat soap, but nothing in here is more dangerous than washing your hands.

What's going on in this science experiment?  The vinegar and baking soda react and release carbon dioxide.  The carbon dioxide gets trapped by the bubbles and makes an even more exciting reaction.  The bubbles carry the food coloring out into beautiful patterns!  Older kids can discuss acids and bases, polar molecules, and properties of soap and water during and after this science project!




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Thursday, April 11, 2013

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{FREE} Color By Number Words Butterfly Printable!!


I am so happy to be a contributor at the wonderful B-Inspired Mama site!  Krissy has tons of resources, ideas, and inspiring projects.  Each month I contribute two {FREE} printables.  This week, you can download a {FREE} Color By Number Words page.  It's a great way to practice (or review!) number and color words!  Check it out here, at B-Inspired Mama!



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Wednesday, April 10, 2013

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Quick & Easy Preschool Balloon Science Experiment



We love science experiments, and when the set up is quick and easy, we are even more likely to enjoy them! Kids love this balloon science project and are happy to repeat it.  For us, it was a springboard for a Bubbly Brew, which I will post in a couple days.

Here's The Quick and Easy Preschool Science Balloon Experiment:

Simple Supplies:
  • balloon (I like the 12-inch balloons best)
  • water bottle (or soda bottle)
  • vinegar
  • baking soda
  • 1-ply bathroom tissue or paper towel (we create this by tearing a paper towel in half)
  • a pan to catch everything

Easy How-To:

1- Set the bottle in the pan.

2- If you haven't mixed vinegar and baking soda before, do this in the pan or in a separate bowl. Your children should know that vinegar and baking soda will react.

2- Fill the bottle 1/3 - 1/2 full of vinegar.

3- Place about 2 tablespoons of baking soda in the tissue and wrap it up.  Ask what your children think will happen if you add the baking soda and place the balloon on top of the bottle.

4- Squish the baking soda inside the bottle and quickly add the balloon.  Watch the excitement!

5- Ask your children what they would like to test next, and help them do it!

Background:

During this science experiment, the vinegar and baking soda react, producing carbon dioxide.  The balloon is filled with carbon dioxide.  Try a variation on this science project by blowing up another balloon and comparing which balloon is heavier!





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Monday, April 8, 2013

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Earth Day Preschool Project: Recycled Materials Ladybug Pinata!

Earth Day is on April 22nd, and there are many, many activities you can do to celebrate with your preschoolers!



Even more importantly, you can help them develop an Earth Day attitude every day by recycling and re-using materials.

Building a pinata from scratch gives your children a fabulous sensory experience, a
building/construction experience, and practice re-using materials!  Like my daughter said, "I bet those newspaper people never knew that their newspaper would become a ladybug pinata!"

Click here for step-by-step directions on how to make a pinata.  Use newspapers and leftover scraps as you mache each layer on the pinata!

Then, paint it like a ladybug, add silly eyes, hide some goodies inside, and use it to celebrate Earth Day...or a birthday, or anything else!



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