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Monday, August 1, 2011

Preschool Science: "COOL" Ice Art for Little Hands

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We had so much fun exploring ice & water last week!
The Lil Divas were sad to see our theme come to an end.
Of course even though we have moved on to our newest theme (zoo animals) - the curiosity, explorations & fun never end.

The last activity I would like to share was a "cool" one! :)

We combined a little Science Activity + Art and came out with some "Cool" Ice Art.
(This activity was inspired by a post I saw on The Artful Parent)


What You Need:
balloons
water
measuring tape
food coloring
paper & pen (for older preschoolers)

*For younger tots you can just skip ahead to the art part of the activity if you don't think they'd enjoy or get the experiment part. Honestly my Lil Divas had so much fun with this - you must try it!* 

What We Did:

1. We filled up balloons with water and then measured them.


2. I made a simple data collection table and we recorded measurements for each balloon.


3. We put the water balloons in the freezer overnight


4. The next day the Lil Divas were running to check on their balloons!
They were so excited to see that they were frozen and so heavy!!!


5. We measured the water balloons and found that they were bigger!
The solid ice had expanded the balloons size!

The Lil Divas were most impressed with how much heavier they were in ice form.
I really wished we had weighed them so we knew just how much heavier they got!
That would definitely be an addition I'd suggest to anyone that is going to try this!

We had these large blocks of ice & the Lil Divas loved playing with them!


I just knew we had to do somehting with them and the Oldest Diva suggested we paint them. I'm sure our frozen paint activity had her mind going & I was wondering how we could do it.

Then I remembered an activity I'd recently seen about ice & salt! :)

So, out came the salt & the fun began!

6. Pour salt directly onto ice block.
Notice the Lil Divas were very generous with the salt. :)

Instantly the ice started to crackle and lots of little craters were formed!
The Lil Divas were in awe.


7. Drop food coloring into the holes
Again, notice we were very liberal with the food coloring.
I tried to get them to just add a few drops but they were not to be stopped! :)


Can you blame them?
Look at how pretty this looks.


As the food coloring slipped through the holes and combined with the melting ice it created a wonderful work of art to behold. The inside of the ice was alive with color.


We left our works of art out for the entire day.
The Lil Divas enjoyed checking up on it and watching it melt.
A very "cool" art project!


Bern

53 comments:

  1. Wow - this is really cool :) I love it! Thanks so much for sharing!!

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  2. I will try this at my school,i also use balloons to make pinatas the kids love them.

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  3. I love this... I am going to find our balloons! :)

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  4. How neat! New follower from the hop. WOuld love for you to follow back :)

    http://wherenothinggoodcomeseasy.blogspot.com/

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  5. That looks like a fun idea! I am sure the my lil dude will love it! I need to put it on my pintrest of things to do!

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  6. This looks so fun!! Definitely on our bucket list!!! :)

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  7. I love these! I can't wait to try it!

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  8. That looks like so much fun! Such a great idea!

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  9. That's absolutely fantastic, am definitely going to have to give it a go. Thanks for sharing.

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  10. Thank you - this was so easy and yet so mesmerizing for the girls. Let me know f you try it! :)

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  11. Very cool! I bet you hated to see them melt, they are so pretty. More fun on another day, I guess!

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  12. I saw your comment on The Artful Parent and had to come over and see. What a great idea! I'm definitely trying this with my kids with balloons!
    xx
    maya

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  13. That looks gorgeous! Thanks for linking up!

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  14. This is so pretty! I'm going to bookmark it and do it with our winter unit in January! Thanks so much for sharing! :)

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  15. Thanks for linking up to Made by Little Hands Monday!! I liked your post so much I am going to feature it tomorrow night!! I hope you come by and check it out!!
    Thanks so much! Hope you had a great weekend!
    Michelle
    www.delicateconstruction.blogspot.com

    P.S. I am a new follower!

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  16. Oh my...I'm doing arts/crafts with all the neighbourhood kids this summer...and I'm thinking I really like this idea...it looks groovy, its ice, and its cheap...my kind of art...thanx for the share...TRULY~!!! xoxo

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  17. What a great idea! We are going to give this a try this week!

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  18. What a fab project. My girls would *love* to put balloons in the freezer! And don't they look gorgeous when they're painted. Going to share this on Facebook and Pinterest :)

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  19. This looks like a really fun craft! I will have to try this with my girls, we have had so many hot days this summer, what a great idea!

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  20. Cool! My boys would love this!

    Jo @ SmileMonsters

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  21. I am pretty certain that the frozen balloons will weight the same as the unfrozen ones - no mass has been added or taken away. The only thing that will change is the volume (i.e. they will look bigger). I have no idea why they "seem" heavier though... must be psychological? or like a dead weight vs a live weight?

    Love the experiment and the resulting prettiness!

    Thanks for linking to Kids Get Crafty!

    Maggy

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  22. Oh! We did the salt and food coloing on ice this summer already - but not the freezing, and measuring of water balloons - I like it, a lot!

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  23. Bern,

    We tried ice sculptures in different forms. Do check this out!

    http://creativitymypassion.blogspot.com/2011/08/seven-ice-sculptures-plastic-easter.html

    Thank you,
    Esther

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  24. we are going to try this tomorrow! very cool

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  25. this is so cool! if i had seen this post before we did ours, i would have thought to let the kids be in charge of the salt! maybe even give it to them in shakers! by the way, i just passed by this post on pinterest so it's definitely traveling around the interweb!

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  26. Very cool! I teach preschool and my class would love this! Thanks!

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  27. What a neat project! I will have to try this. Thanks for sharing!

    primaryjunction.blogspot.com

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  28. I am pinning this! Fabulous idea. My girls are a little young so I might skip the measuring but it's a great way to get in some math. The sculptures turned out gorgeous!
    Vicky @ www.messforless.net

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  29. WAY cool! This is SUCH an awesome activity. SO many different things to teach. I can see why it's so popular!

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  30. What a brilliant project: I love the texture of the finished work of art. Shame there's no picture of the pool of coloured water at the end!

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  31. So beautiful! Timely that I saw this because I have a similar post scheduled for my blog, and I am going to link up to this one.

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  32. I need to try this with JDaniel! It looks like so much fun!

    Stopping from the Kid Bloggers Hop!

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  33. Wow! That is a great idea! My children would love it! xx

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  34. awesome! I pinned this on pinterest!
    visiting from

    http://morethanabcand123.blogspot.com/

    I would love you to come visit me too!

    happy new year!

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  35. Wow! Those do look pretty neat! I have a few balloons laying around here somewhere....

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  36. Pretty cool but just so you know the balloons weighed the same frozen. Nothing was added or taken away.

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  37. I love this idea! I will do this with the children in my daycare soon. However, do NOT think we will be using food coloring! What a mess that would be, parents picking up there kids with colored hands! I will have to think of something else for color! Thanks for sharing.

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  38. I did this with my daycare and we watched it melt outside. It was fun and beautiful however I forgot salt isn't awesome for our grass and we burned it and coloured it blue! Oh well it was fun

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    Replies
    1. Ouch, yes salt isn't good for grass but it was all in the name of kids, science & fun so worth it :) hehe!

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  39. This is super fun! I know my sons would love this! Can't wait to try it! Thanks!

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    Replies
    1. Oh, Pam - you must try it with the boys - just have lots of salt on hand. My girls LOVED pouring it on so I can imagine your boys will too :)

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  40. This would be a great thing to do in the cold of winter, especially to leave out in the snow for a while.

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  41. Hey beautiful work. I'll use this for my class project. thanks for sharing.

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  42. Oh my, the girls will just love this!
    Now, to pin it under science or art? Decisions, decisions.

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  43. My boys (5 1/2) has a really great time...and thus so did I...tahnk you!

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  44. Thanks for this wonderful idea! We just did this last week in our preschool class, and it was a huge hit.

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  45. I'm using this great idea for my University assignment which revolves around water! :)
    Thank you! :)

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