Our boys love science, and more specifically, our boys love bubbling, exploding science. In this fun four-ingredient activity bubbly, exploding science takes place right before your eyes.

You can buy some great items to get on your bubbly way in our shop!

 

Here is what you will need:

Ingredients:

Baking Soda

Vinegar

Dish Soap

Food Coloring

Materials:

Large bowl

Glass or Cup (preferably transparent so you can see all of the magic)

Phase 1:

Before we started, we took a few minutes to talk about safety. While all of the ingredients are safe to touch, contact with eyes should be avoided.  Next, we took a few minutes to investigate each ingredient independently. We talked a little about the differences between solids and liquids. Then, we talked about what we thought might happen if we mixed all of these ingredients together. The boys couldn’t get over the smelliness of the vinegar, which they said, stunk like an Easter egg!

Steps:

Pour vinegar into a glass so that it is about ¾ full. Place the glass into a much larger bowl, which will be used to collect the vinegar/baking soda overflow that is about to occur.

Place about 3 tablespoons of baking soda into a small cup

(Varying the amount of vinegar and baking soda used will vary the reaction slightly)

Some good questions to ask:

What does the baking soda feel like?

What does the vinegar feel like?

How is the baking soda different than the vinegar?

What do you think might happen if we mix these ingredients together? Why do you think that?

Vocabulary you could introduce:

Hypothesis- a guess based on the information you already have

Prediction- a guess about what you think will happen next


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Phase 2:

Place a few drops of food coloring to the cup of vinegar, or in the case of our boys, dump half of the bottle in. They were curious about what would happen if we added more coloring to the vinegar, so we took a moment to find out! The fact that the vinegar became so saturated with color was amazing to them, plus it was really cool to watch the colors dance and swirl as they sunk down through the vinegar.

Steps:

Place a few drops of food coloring to the vinegar and stir.

Add a few drops of dish soap, but do not stir.

Some good questions to ask:

What do you think will happen when we add the food coloring to the vinegar? What might

happen if we add more food coloring?

What do you notice about the dish soap when we added it to the vinegar?

Why do you think we are adding soap?

Vocabulary you could introduce:

Solution- a mix of two substances that cannot be separated once they are mixed together

Phase 3:

Now it’s time for the grand finale! Pouring the baking soda into the vinegar will create a fun reaction, and the addition of the soap makes it even cooler! The boys are still talking about this weeks later!

Steps:

Take the cup of baking soda and pour it into the cup of vinegar. The baking soda {sodium bicarbonate} is a base and vinegar {acetic acid} is an acid. When you mix these ingredients together, they will react. As a result of the reaction, water, a salt, and carbon dioxide gas will be formed. The carbon dioxide will form bubbles, and these bubbles will mingle with the soap to cause even more foamy awesomeness!

Some good questions to ask:

What happened?

Was your guess about what might happen correct?

Why do you think this happened?

If we do this again, what would you like to try differently?

Vocabulary you could introduce:

Reaction- what happens when something is added to something else

Acid- something that usually has a sour taste

Base-something that will cause a reaction when mixed with an acid

Carbon Dioxide-the gas that is created in the firm of bubbles during this experiment

Phase 4:

Although it wasn’t intended, the boys spent the next twenty minutes playing with the solution in the bowl. Its colorful, foamy nature makes it so much fun to swirl around and play with.

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Phase 5:

Wash hands thoroughly.

You can check out our shop for many of the ingredients that you will need to perform this experiment along with more sciency goodness.

You can also grab what you need from the links below.

 

Apps

Elementary Science

iTooch Elementary School | Math, Language Arts and Science worksheets for 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th and 5th grades – eduPad Inc.
goREACT – Museum of Science and Industry, Chicago

 

This video and post is for entertainment purposes only. |