Monday, April 23, 2012

Fun with vinegar, food coloring, and Baking soda

Growing up, my mother used to do all sorts of fun projects with my sister and I. Recently, I was reminded of today's project, when I ran across it on Pinterest. I decided Conrad would appreciate it, and so...today's science activity began! :)
For this project, you will need the following items:
  • White Vinegar
  • Baking soda(we used a whole box)
  • Food coloring
  • egg cups, or small containers(we used baby food containers)
  • a large baking pan
  • Medicine droppers, or syringes 





 Dump the baking soda into the baking pan, and spread it out until it covers the bottom of the pan. Next, Pour vinegar into the small containers, and add a few drops of food coloring to each container.

Use the Medicine droppers and syringes in the vinegar solution, as seen above.
Now, Have fun filling syringes with vinegar and dropping them onto the baking soda. The results will turn out something like this:
You can also experiment with mixing colors. I used this as an opportunity to talk with Conrad about what the different colors make when mixed.
Conrad had a lot of fun playing with the color explosions, and asked a lot of questions about the colors mixing. I also enjoyed myself (mixing colors has always been one of my favorite things to do, and I love the rainbow look of things).
This project was simple to set up, easy for most ages to do, and fairly easy to clean up. I must warn, that because you are using vinegar with food coloring, the solution will stain clothing, and possibly hands. I had Conrad take off his white shirt before we began.

The Biggest surprise for me came when I was cleaning up. As I began to rinse the leftover mixture down the sink...the ugly brown-green color from the top went away, and this is what I got:

 as I said before, I love mixing colors, and I love rainbows. When this appeared underneath the gross brown-green color, I was pleasantly surprised! I had already sent Conrad outside to play, so he didn't get to see this, but you can bet next time we do this project, I will remember to show him! :)

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