science Archives - JDaniel4s Mom

Spring Shadow Matching Activity

February 25, 2024 By Deirdre

Your children will have to explore these spring shadow-matching activity cards. If your children can’t read the words on the word cards, you could read them to them. You could read the word card to them and have them match the word you’ve read to the picture that matches it.

Do you have to use the spring shadow-matching activity cards this way? No, the above idea is just a suggestion. The cards can be used any way you want to use them.

Getting the Spring Shadow Matching Activity

The Spring Shadow Matching Activity is a PDF. Once you have downloaded, the set you will need to open it with a PDF reader like Acrobat Reader.

First, you will need to download the set.

Spring Shadow Matching Game Download

Second, if you don’t have Acrobat Reader you will need to download it. The algorithm page is an Acrobat Reader PDF file.

Third, you must go to your download file and open the page. You may be asked if you want the file to open right after downloading it. You won’t have to hunt for it in your download file if you are.

What Units Could These Go With?

Groundhog’s Day
Daylight Saving Fall Forward or Fall Back Day
Light and Energy

Books Based on Shadows and Light

Building background before starting an activity is always a good idea. These are wonderful books that have a light and shadow theme. Some of the books are non-fiction and others are fiction.

The links below are affiliate links.

Shadows and Reflections explores shadow and light by looking at nature photographs. It is a beautiful book to page through.

Light: Shadows, Mirrors, and Rainbows include fun activities that explore light.

The Black Rabbit features a rabbit that feels that he has a black rabbit following him everywhere. He learns about shadows and his shadow as the book progresses.

Making the Matching Cards Reusable

If you plan on using the pages over and over again, you may want to laminate them. Below I have suggested products that you may want to use to cover them.

The links below are affiliate links. As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases. My Amazon Picks

Scotch Brand PRO Thermal Laminator, Never Jam…$54.68~~$128.93~~ (11154)

Scotch Thermal Laminating Pouches, 100 Count-P…$15.98~~$24.68~~ (63556)

Scotch Thermal Laminating Pouches, 200- Count-…$27.99~~$42.99~~ (23612)

Hammermill Printer Paper, Great White 100% Recy…$17.00 (4917)AllAds by Amazon

More Learning Activities with Shadows

Space Themed Shadow Puppets

Shadow Games- Building Block Numbers

Science Experiments for Kids- Turtle Balancing

July 31, 2014 By Deirdre

Turtle balancing is one of those experiments for kids that looks easy, but is tricky. Coming up with ways to balance them is easy, but what ways will allow the turtles to stay standing. It is easier to get them tumble than it is to get them to all to stay stacked. We found two ways that worked right away. Coming up with more was challenge.

Making this set of balancing turtle was super easy and they didn’t require a lot of supplies.

Here is what you need:

Four paper towel rolls

Magic marker black

Scissors

Green paint

Printer paper

Pencil

How to put the turtles for these experiments for kids together:

Trace a turtle on a piece of copy paper folded in half in pencil. Then cut the turtle out. The turtle cut out will be a template you use to trace the turtle onto the paper towel rolls.

Place the turtle outline on one paper towel roll at a time and trace the turtle onto it. I tried to place the nose of the turtle close the edge of the paper towel roll so that it would be easier to cut out.

The paper towel rolls I used were easy to cut, but not so flimsy that the turtle’s legs would collapse under them. I was able to cut them out while watching JDaniel play in the yard one afternoon. They took no time at all.

The original idea was to draw a grid on each turtles back and place a spiral each square of the grid. Once that was done, green paint would be placed over the marker design. When we did that, the design did not show through well. JDaniel explored the turtles and trying to balancing them a little and then I drew the design on top of the green paint. The design looked much better on top of the paint.

With the turtle creation completed it was time to go back to balancing the turtles.

Science Experiments for Kids- Turtle Balancing

One way to balance the turtles that we tried was to create a turtle tower with one turtle on top of the other. The next best way was to have two turtles on the bottom and to balance the rest of the turtles on them. The second way did send a turtle tumbling at first. Placing the turtles carefully on each other in just the right place was key. Finding that right place was tricky.

Having more than four turtles would make this science experiment more challenging. Thankfully we go through a lot of paper towels! We should be able to add to the turtles number by the end of the week.

Below I have placed an affiliate link for your convenience

After exploring this science experiment, I remembered the book Yertle the Turtle and Other Stories I will have to look for it the next time we go to the library. It would be great to read it and then pull out our growing number of turtles to balance them.

Here are some other science experiments for kids we have done this summer:

Science Ideas- Controlling the Flow of Water

Measuring Forms of Water

Polar Ice Fishing

How Long Will a Lego Boat Float?

Kindergarten Activity-Exploring Positional Words

July 25, 2014 By Deirdre

While this kindergarten activity may simply look like blowing water around a blue plastic block, it is so much more than that. This kindergarten activity explores what will happen when you blow an object from various areas around the object. Each of those areas represents a positional words that kids in kindergarten need to learn. During this activity you can talk about the words above, below and under, beside, and behind. As you talked about each word and what it means, a child or children will blow a plastic straw from that position.

At my house we took the opportunity to talk about how much the blue plastic block moved from each position. We found that some straw blowing positions made the block move a lot more than others. I found that there was one position in particular that my son like the best and seemed to blow the hardest from. I bet as you look through the pictures in this post you will be able to figure out what position that was.

Putting This Kindergarten Activity Together

You will need the following supplies to put this activity together:

Plastic toy
Turkey roasting pan
Plastic straw

Optional: Positional words written on index cards. We didn’t do this but, it would make this a reading activity too.

Creating Your Learning Space

Fill the turkey roasting pan with water. You will want to make sure that you have enough water in the roasting pan for the object to move freely when it is hit with the breeze from the straw.

Place the object in the turkey roasting plan and you are ready to go.

Exploring Positional Words

Depending on how much experience your child or children have with positional words, you may want to review what the words mean before you start the activity. If you would rather jump right into the activity, you can select one positional word at a time and have your child or children test out that blowing position in the roasting pan.

As they are testing each position out, you can talk about how much the object moves when you blow the straw from that position. Know that some children may blower harder or softer just to see what happens. My son loved seeing the water fill with bubbles when he blew the straw under the block with great vigor. He also loved blowing the straw beside the blue block under the water rather than above it.

Some kids may try to test out all the positional words except above from beneath the water because they will love to see the water bubble. You can guide them back to focusing on distance the object you have selected moved or stick to exploring the meaning of the positional words. This kindergarten activity can be as flexible or focused as you want it to be.

If you want to keep it focused, you may want to leave the materials out for your children to explore later on. Of course you could put out the materials and have the children explore them before you even start this kindergarten activity. Either way I think children would love been given time to explore the materials

Other Water Week Activities

Science Ideas- Flowing Water High and Low

Cool Science Experiment- Polar Ice Fishing

Easy Experiments- Measuring Forms of Water

15 Awesome Preschool Activities with Water

Even more science activities can be found on my Early Learning- Science Activities board on Pinterest.
Follow JDaniel4’s Mom’s board Early Learning- Science Activities on Pinterest.

Easy Experiments- Measuring Forms of Water

July 22, 2014 By Deirdre

This week I am sharing water, water everywhere. Easy experiments and explorations with water will be shared here on the blog as well as on Pinterest, Facebook, and Google +. There will even be water related pictures shared on Instagram. I hope you will stop by each of these venues to check out them out. Some of the posts will be the same, but many will be different.

Comparing Water in a Glass

Do all forms of water take up the same amount of space in a container? Will ice create more or less water in a glass? This fun science experiments will look for the answers to these questions.

What do you need for these easy experiments?

3 cups or jars

Ice

Water

Measuring cup ( 2 cups)

Drawing paper

Crayons

Pencil

How do you conduct these easy experiments?

Getting the Cups Ready

You will want to place the cups or jars into a roasting pan or a plastic tub before you fill them if you are doing the experiment inside. If you are doing it outside, you may decide that it isn’t necessary.

Cup One

Into the first jar or cup, you will place water. It doesn’t matter if it is tap water, bottled water or filtered water. Make sure that you fill it about 1/3 of the way up if you use jars.

Cup Two

The second cup or jar is filled with ice cubes about 1/3 of the way up the container.

Cup Three

The final cup or jar is filled with ice and as much water as you need to get the contents of the glass up to 1/3 full.

Melting Time

Set the jars or cups in a warm spot. The spot could be inside or outside of your house. The goals are to have the contents of the cups melt so, the warmer the spot the better. On a hot day here in South Carolina that doesn’t take very long.

Measuring Time

Slowly and carefully place the contents of each cup into the measuring up. Record the amount of water that was transferred from each plastic cup into the measuring cup paper with a pencil. Then draw the results of these easy experiments with crayon.

If you would prefer to have your children record their results in a notebook or just share them orally that would be fine too.

Which cup do you think will have the most water? Stop by our Facebook to see how this experiment turned out.

Other Easy Experiments with Water

To explore more easy experiments with water please visit my Early Learning Science Pinterest board.

Follow JDaniel4’s Mom’s board Early Learning- Science Activities on Pinterest.

Amazing Earth Day Activities For Kids

April 20, 2014 By Deirdre

Here is a collection of amazing Earth Day activities for kids that I have created for this blog and for several others. These crafts, science tools, and activities feature items that have been recycled and reused. Wait! There are a few Earth Day themed snacks and one or two activities that are not recycled. They were too much fun to leave out of this collection.

Newspaper Bowler Hat

Backyard Science Table

Wrapping Paper Collage

Blueberries and Grape Earth

Greater Than and Less Than Egg Carton Gator

Paper Bag Turkey (Using newspaper, bread tags, and paper bags)

Former Wipe Container Become a Sensory Bin

Blueberries and Grape Earth

Seven Ways to Use the Bottles in My Recycling Bin

Plastic Jug Jellyfish

Lorax Made of Magazine Pictures

Recycled Treasures Christmas Tree

Milk Jug Skeleton

Water Bottle Fish Mobile

Egg Carton Color Matching Activity

Wipes Container Emotions Pumpkin Game

Hanger Balance

Old Rope Letter Walking

Soda Bottle Flower

Plastic Lettuce Box Terrarium
Homemade Animal Tunnels
Egg Toss Bottles

Egg Carton Catapult

Coffee Filter Earth Craft

Elephant CD Puppet

Challenge

If you have a recycling bin at your house, I want to challenge you to sift through it with your children. I bet that you will find that you come up with lots of fun ideas as you look through the items it contains. There will be things that would be great building materials, crafting items, math manipulatives, etc…

If you take this challenge, please come back and tell me what you have decided to use one of the items for. Feel free to stop by my Facebook page. There will be a series of Facebook Earth Day idea posts there where you can share them.

For more Earth Day activities to do with children please stop by my Earth Day board on Pinterest.

Fun Activities with Chicks and Eggs

April 17, 2014 By Deirdre

This is the time of year for fun activities that feature chicks and eggs. Easter is part of the reason, but it is also the season that many birds give birth during. (We can hear the baby birds chirping outside our front windows.) A number of big and little chicks along with their eggs have been featured in posts on this blog.

Let me share twenty of them with you!

Cool Math for Kids- Easter Egg Learning– Children decorate a construction paper egg with primary shapes. They are then asked to record how many of each shape they used to decorate their egg.

Easter Chick- Read.Explore.Learn.– Shares several fun activities with chick and eggs. One activity includes a bingo dapper and a polka dotted chicken. Read.Explore.Learn.- Counting Chicks and Ducks- This post focuses on several math activities with a poultry themed. Working with one on one correspondence is one of them.

12 Ways to Learn Using Plastic Eggs– A dozen different learning activities using plastic eggs are shared in this post.

Dolch Sight Words- Unscrambling Egg Letters– Dolch sight words are hidden in plastic eggs. Children are asked to unscramble the letters to form Dolch sight words.

Green Eggs and Ham- Read.Explore.Learn- This post shares several green eggs and ham themed activities. A tic tac toe game with bacon strip crosses and green egg circles make this game really fun.

Fun Craft for Kids- Torn Paper Chick– Torn paper gives this spring chicks a feathery effect that is fun and super cute.

{Rabbit’s Food} Read.Explore.Learn– Shares a fine motor activity featuring math, carrot shaped eggs, and numeral writing.

Cool Science Experiments- Making Spider Web Eggs- Shares how to make hard boiled eggs that when peeled are going to have a spider web design on them. These have serious awe factor.

Cool Science Experiments- Making a Rubber Egg– Directions on how to create a bouncy egg are shared in this post.

Science Experiments for Kids- Spinning Eggs- This post includes are downloadable recording sheet. Children explore whether a hard boiled or raw egg will spin.

Science Experiment for Kids- Floating or Sinking Eggs- Shares via a science experiment sheet how to make an egg float in a glass or water. The experiment sheet also includes a section to record the experiments results.

Kids Science- Egg Carton Catapult– Half of an egg carton becomes a catapult with just two other materials we all have a home. There aren’t any fun activities with chicks or eggs in it ,but sure is fun to fling objects from a catapult that used to contain eggs.

Science Experiments for Kids- Frying Eggs on the Driveway– During a heatwave we decided to see if we could fry an egg on the driveway. It worked. JDaniel is still talking about this experiment.

{Science for Children} Falling Chickens– This post shares the book Loopy Coop Chickens Letting Go and a science experiment we conducted with cupcake liner chicken.

Easter Game- Egg Toss Bottles- Two recycled juice bottles are transformed into plastic egg catchers. This looks like an easy game to play, but catching the egg in the catcher is trickier than it looks.

Plastic Egg Snake– Old plastic eggs become a fun threading activity in this fun post.

Deviled Egg Recipe for Kids– Walks you through how to turn hard boiled Easter egg into a delicious snack that your children will love.

Easter Bunny Salad with Leftover Eggs– Leftover hard boiled eggs and toasted bunny croutons make the salad in this bento lunch fun and delicious!

Deviled Egg Recipe for Kids– Walks you through how to turn hard boiled Easter egg into a delicious snack that your children will l

{Kid’s Lunch} Apple Chicken Salad- Shares a delicious chicken salad with an apple crunch.

These fun activities with chicks and eggs covers a wide array of learning skills and fun foods. I hope that you will find at least one or two egg and chick theme activities here that you would like to try.

Butterflies in Crafts and Activities

March 24, 2014 By Deirdre

We haven’t seen any butterflies since the temperature here started to yo-yo back and forth so, we made a cupcake liner sun catcher butterfly to remind us that spring is here. We can’t see the butterfly flitting around the yard, but we can see it superimposed over the view of our yard as we look out the window. Maybe when the temperature warms up we will be able see our sun catcher butterfly and a real live butterfly at the same time. I hope it warms up enough for that soon.

I cut out the outline of two butterflies and shapes on their wings. JDaniel could probably have traced my outline and done some cutouts himself, but I was inspired to do this after he had gone to bed one night.

The trickiest part was having the paper stay folded as I cut out the each shape. I didn’t want to end up with lots of crease lines in the paper. Had JDaniel been awake he would have told me that wouldn’t matter or we could have taken turns holding the paper for each other.

I found a super fun set of cupcake liners when I went to JoAnn’s to get the materials for the Easter Egg Toss Bottles project. I knew that they would be thin enough to let light shine through them and colorful enough to make pretty sun catcher. They were also super easy to cut.

The tricky part about using the cupcake liners was that it was hard to cut them to fit the cutouts perfectly. The smaller cutouts were easy. It was the long cutouts at the top of the butterfly’s wings that offered a challenge. At first we tried to cut the outside edge of the cupcake liner to see if it would be long enough. It wasn’t long enough. The arch in the liner kept it from working. The only way to make it work was to layer to sections of cutout cupcake liners. We really weren’t sure how that would look, but it end up being okay.

A wonderful attribute of cupcake liners is that they have a smooth flat section and a fluted section. The areas we used the fluted section on ended up having a really wonderful texture to them. The texture wasn’t too noticeable, but was just enough to add a little bit of a funky flair to the craft.

Cupcake liners have been a wonderful crafting tool at our house. We have made a cupcake liner bouquet and pumpkin craft with them so far. I am thinking a decorated Easter egg may be in our future.

Here some other crafts and activities featuring butterflies we have done:

Science Experiment- Making Butterfly Wings Flap
Butterfly Number Count
Butterfly Bento

How have you used cupcake liners outside of making cupcakes or muffins with them?

Science Experiments for Kids: Coffee Can Catapult

March 20, 2014 By Deirdre

Homemade catapults like this coffee can catapult are great fun to explore and create science to use in experiments for kids. We have previous explored making homemade catapults by making a rolled paper catapult and an egg carton catapult. This homemade catapult continued our exploration of using recycled materials to create catapults.

The only drawback to using a recycled coffee can to create with is the smell. To eliminate the smell we had our coffee can sit in the sink with hot soapy water for half a day. The coffee grains scent had really permeated the plastic in the coffee can. When we had drained the can and dried it off, it smelled more like the lemony scented dish washing soap we had used. A lemony scented can smells much better than a coffee scented one.

The actual creation of the catapult itself took no time at all. We simply place two large rubber bands around the coffee can. Our coffee can had a ridge near the top of it that the rubber band easily slipped into. Then we placed a plastic spoon under the rubber band. We lucked out and had a coffee can that had curves on its sides so that coffee drinkers could easily pick up the container. We place a plastic spoon into one of those curves. The spoon was able to swing back into the curve after the catapult had launched the object in its bowl.

If you buy a different brand of coffee that comes in a can with a different design, you can still easily make this catapult. The brand of coffee that my husband likes just ended up working out really well for this project.

How to launch this catapult:

Place the object you want to send sailing through the air into the bowl of the spoon.
Pull back the bowl of the spoon as far back as you feel is necessary to get the object to fly.
Release the bowl of the spoon and watch the object fly.
Push or pull the spoon up higher or lower if you are not happy with how far the object flies.

Types of objects to send flying in the Homemade Coffee Can Catapult:

Tips

Heavy object fly farther ( We started with pom-poms and they didn’t fly very far.)
Small objects that fit in the bowl tend to fly farther too.

We tested:

Pom-Poms
Pennies
Pebbles
Marbles
Dried Beans

I hope you will try making this homemade coffee can catapult. Please let me know what object flew the best for you in this science experiment for kids.

Here are two other catapults we have made:

Egg Carton Catapult

Building a Paper Roll Catapult

Together Box Review

March 18, 2014 By Deirdre

We all have times in our lives when we want to do activities with our kids, but we don’t have the time to gather all the materials we would need to do them. At my house having to rush out at any moment to meet my mom at the hospital due to a fall or keep things running at home when I come home from work, really hampers time to shop for the bits and pieces I might need for an activity. When I came across Together Box, I knew that I had found a great way to have the materials for fun activities sent right to me.

Everything needed for the activities featured in the each kit comes with the kit. It was truly wonderful to open up the box and know that we were ready to get started. There was no running out to get something or searching for something in a cabinet.

JDaniel and I just took the box to the kitchen table, flipped through the activity choices and selected the one that we wanted to do first. It was totally stress free. It was truly a wonderful opportunity to spend time together and play.

The first activity we selected was the Balloon Ninja Marshmallow Launcher activity. I tried to create a face on my balloons that looked just like the one in the picture on the activity card. JDaniel created his own original design. All the activities on the cards are open to creative tweaks. I just love that.

We hung the ninjas on the fences in our backyard and put a sheet on the ground just below the ninjas. We didn’t want to get the marshmallows dirty. ( You can’t eat marshmallows that have fallen on the ground.) It was such fun to try to hit the balloons. JDaniel found that if you got too close to the balloons that they rebounded off of the balloons and flew behind the sheet. It took several marshmallow launches to find the right distance to pull back the balloon launcher.

The second activity we decided to try was the rock launcher. We set up this activity between the handrails on our front steps by tying a string with a straw on it onto each handrail. Then we attached a balloon to the straw with tape. (Yes, even tape came with the kit.) I think my son liked the noise the balloon gave as it flew across the string as much as watching the balloon fly.

We did our activities outside, but each could have been done inside. That is another wonderful thing about the activities that come in the kit they can be done anywhere.

I think the kit would be great to get for your own family to do just for fun, but I also think it would be fun to send to a family that is going through a challenging time. It sure gave my son and I an opportunity to build a memory during a though time at my house.

Disclaimer: I was compensated for this review and was sent a Together Box sample box. I would buy another box in a heartbeat.

Kids Science: Egg Carton Catapult

February 25, 2014 By Deirdre

There is just something wonderful about kids, science, and an egg carton catapult. JDaniel and I took a homemade egg carton catapult out to the ramp in front of our shed and flung acorn after acorn into the air. Some covered a great distance and others barely made it out of the red plastic spoon we used as a lever. Before I share more about what made the difference in the distance an acorn flew let me tell you how we made the egg carton catapult.

Kids Science Catapult

Materials:

Two thick rubber bands
Cardboard egg carton
Scissors
Plastic spoon
Items to fling and place in the egg carton to weight it down. (We used acorns.)

Steps for Creating the Egg Carton Catapult:

Cut the cardboard egg carton in half widthwise.
Place objects in the egg cups inside the egg carton to weight it down.
Wrap a rubber band around the side of the egg carton. Our egg carton had a lip that we could put the rubber band below to hold it in place.
Wrap the second rubber band around the egg carton from top to bottom.
Place the spoon beneath both rubber bands.

How to Achieve the Farthest Fling

Kids Science Egg Carton Catapult - This great for exploring how catapults work.

Best Item to Fling

We found that we were able to fling the heavier acorns the farthest. The smaller and lighter acorns barely made it a few inches away from the egg carton catapult. The larger and heavier acorns traveled at least a foot if not two.

Successful Flinging Technique

You could simply put an object in a spoon that has been carefully drawn back and then you can let it fly. It will fly. It may even fly pretty far. JDaniel found that pulling it back and pulling the egg carton off the ramp just a tiny bit added to the force that the spoon was able to use to shoot the object forward. When the carton was pushed down to hold it in place the spoon flung the object just a bit closer to the catapult.

We didn’t explore moving the handle of the spoon higher or lower between the rubber bands. We probably should have. Shifting the spoon handle up to create a long lever at the top would probably have made a huge difference.

We will just have to have another science time with our egg carton catapult. There are probably a lot of other variables we can explore.

If you are looking for another catapult idea you may want to try our paper roll catapult.

If you are looking for more science activities for preschool or kindergarten age children, you may want to explore my Early Learning Science board on Pinterest.

Deirdre Smith writes/owns JDaniel4’s Mom. After twenty years as a elementary school and technology resource teacher in Northern Virginia, she became a stay at home mom in upstate South Carolina. Her blog features ways she and her 5 year old are exploring learning, crafting, creating healthy meals and living life to its fullest. Deirdre can also be found on her blog’s FB page. You can also check her out on Google+.