At-Home Science Project: Pencil Poke without the Soak Polymer Exploration
Please find below our daily SolBe Family update letter containing helpful resources and exciting projects to explore while we all do our part to stay home during this pandemic. Subscribe here to receive daily updates. June 5, 2020 SolBe Families, Science Friday! We will be sharing our Social-Emotional Learning Resource articles beginning on Monday 6/8. For now…here is another classic science experiment for “Science Fridays!” Sometimes you just need some good ol’ fashion excitement! Project of the Day: Pencil Poke without the Soak-Polymer Exploration Materials Ziplock plastic sandwich bag Sharpened pencils Water The Experiment Watch this video for step-by-step project directions and ways to communicate the science behind this experiment to your kiddos. If you try this at home, share your pictures and videos with us on Instagram @solbe.learning so we can see how your experiment turned out! Step One Lay out all of your materials! I recommend laying a towel out or trying to experiment outside…this is a wet one! Step Two Fill your ziplock up about 3/4 of the way to full with water and squeeze all of the air out of the top of the bag. Be sure your pencils are sharp! Step Three Exciting part! Hold the bag up with one hand and slowly push the pencil through both sides of the bag. Do not use force, the bag will pop- as you see in the video experiment! Step Four Poke additional pencils through one at a time. Ask plenty of questions to encourage the kids to create and test hypotheses. “If we add another pencil- will water burst out?” We learned a lot (and had a few chuckles) from our failed attempts. We also enjoyed pulling the pencils out at the end `and watching the water shoot out from our puncture holes. Most important direction, as always: HAVE FUN! More resources to follow in the coming days. Feedback and more ideas welcome! Above all, be well and stay healthy! The SolBe Team
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