Wanting to integrate some hands-on experiments into your family's science studies, but don't want to become a scientist-gone-mad in planning for and setting up a complicated, time-consuming experiment? I found a great resource for simple, easy to execute science experiments, and best of all- it's FREE!
Each week, the children and I check our e-mail inbox to find a fun, quick experiment just waiting for us to try! Robert Krampf has a website FULL of free, easy science experiments which are all archived according to the specific field of science it is related to (Chemistry, Biology, Physics, etc.) We signed up for his free weekly e-mailing which explains how to do that week's experiment, as well as a quick video showing just how he performed the experimcnt.
A recent experiment we performed was on the topic of Chromatography, the science of separating chemicals based on how they stick to paper. This may sound complicated, but it's not! Even our preschool aged children enjoyed helping with this!
First we gathered our supplies, which we already had in the house:
photo copyright 2008 Domestic Legacies
Materials needed: Coffee filter strips (or watercolor paper), rubbing alcohol, glass jars, various brands of black ink pens, and scissors for cutting the coffee filter into 1 inch wide strips.
Next, on each strip of coffee filter, we placed a black dot of ink about 1/2 inch from one end, then marked the other end with a descriptive word of the pen used (like the brand) to distinguish it from the others. After pouring about 1/4 inch of rubbing alcohol into the jars, we placed the strips of paper, dot side down, into the jars, allowing the strips to stand up in the jars without submerging the dots. The coffee filter strips immediately began to absorb the alcohol:
photo copyright 2008 Domestic Legacies
We checked on the progress of our Chromatography after a few minutes, and found the ink starting to rise in lines on the coffee filter strips:
photo copyright 2008 Domestic Legacies
After waiting about 20 minutes, we noticed a band of ink forming on the coffee filter strip. The individual colors that comprised the black ink had separated out according to how well they stick to paper!:
Chromatography wasn't on our list of things to study that week, but it was a very nice, quick detour from our usual Science studies that allowed us to get some hands-on, fun learning in! Would you like to know where you can sign up for these great experiments? Just go to Robert Krampf's Website , and come back soon to Domestic Legacies and tell us what experiments you and your children have enjoyed!
P.S. I noticed the last couple of weeks, Mr. Krampf has not been posting an experiment, but info about science fair experiments. So, if you've signed up for the experiments, don't despair...once his series on science fairs is finished, I'm sure the experiments will be back! Go to his website for tons of experiments you can do now!
Copyright 2008 Domestic Legacies
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