Making Blood

The girls are studying the human body in their science curriculum (R.E.A.L. - Life), and we had SO much fun making a blood model as one their labs. 

To make blood, you need corn syrup (plasma), red hot candies (red blood cells), lentils (platelets), and white beans (white blood cells).  Have fun mixing the ingredients together and try not to eat too many read hots (Please see the try before you buy Life Science Guide for more detailed instructions and printable lab sheets).


We talked about what each item represented, and O(6) was VERY skeptical that the liquid part of the blood is clear.  However, when she poured the red hot candies into the mixture, a light bulb went off and she said "Oh!  Now I understand why blood is red!"



I realized that E(3) was really paying attention to the lesson, when her thumb was bleeding and she sadly said "I don't have ANY platelets.  I just don't have any platelets!"  She thought that since she was bleeding, and it wasn't scabbing over quickly, she didn't have any platelets!

You can check out this curriculum to "try it before you buy" here.  

Absorption Color Wheel

When I saw this super fun and simple science experiment via Pinterest, I thought it would be perfect for our upcoming beach vacation (gotta fit a little bit of school in each week :), and it was!  I decided to expand on it a little to make a color wheel.

To do this experiment, you need 6 clear glasses, water, 6 plain white paper towels, and food coloring (red, blue, and yellow).   We filled every other glass about 2/3 of the way full with water (a total of 3 glasses).  The girls took turns putting food coloring in each glass with water.  So, we had one glass with blue water, one glass with yellow water, and one glass with red water.


Between each of these glasses was an empty glass, and the 6 glasses formed a circle.  We rolled the paper towels and connected the glasses with the paper towels (this may not make sense, but it makes sense if you look at the picture).


Then we watched and waited.  After a few minutes, we could see the water beginning to slowly travel up the paper towels.  We kept watching...


We left and came back later to check on the progress.


We went into town for snow cones and to play at the playground and came back to find this!


The colors had traveled all the way up the paper towels and were beginning to mix!  We were all VERY excited!
When we woke up the next morning, this is what we saw.  The colors were mixing within the glasses, but they were very dark and the colors on the paper towels hadn't really mixed.


So, we kept watching, and by the end of the day we had this!



By the next morning, the paper towels had soaked up all the water and were beginning to dry out.


Throughout this process, we discussed the "why" of it...capillary action and the mixing of primary colors to form secondary colors.  We were very excited by how well this project turned out, and we saved our colorful and beautiful paper towels for a future art project.

Making Plant and Animal Cell Models

The girls and I had fun making plant and animal cell models to go along with O's R.E.A.L Science (Life) curriculum.

First, we mixed up the gelatin.



After it set, O(6) added in a grape tomato nucleus for each cell and grape chloroplasts for the plant cell.

Simple, fun, and educational!

Soap Clouds

The girls and I had SO much fun making soap clouds last week!  We put a bar of Ivory soap in the microwave, turned it on, and watched.



I don't know how long we microwaved the soap because we kept stopping the microwave to check it.  The cloud deflated a bit every time we opened the microwave door, so then we'd turn it on for a little longer.  At one point, we pulled the cloud off the soap and there was a little bar of soap left.  O(5) and I made the mistake of touching it, so we had HOT sticky soap on our fingers and it hurt!  We put the bar back in the microwave and made a 2nd cloud.   We let it cool before touching it this time!





We took the soap clouds down to the slip n slide to make it slippery...it didn't help much.  We just aren't that good at slipping and sliding :)




The girls had fun using the soap clouds to scrub the pedal boat.



This was so simple and so much fun.  Next time they are planning to use their soap clouds to clean their play house!

The idea for making soap clouds came from this blog via Pinterest.

Naked Eggs Science Experiment

The girls, Elliott, and I had fun conducting a Naked Egg Science Experiment in the weeks following his brain surgery.

First, we put 2 raw eggs in 2 cups of vinegar (1 for each girl).  The girls were excited to see that the eggs were immediately covered in thousands of teeny, tiny bubbles.






After a day or so, the shell mostly disintegrated, and we rubbed the rest of it off.  The girls loved carefully holding their naked eggs!



We put each egg back into the cups and added water and food coloring.  E(2) chose red food coloring and O(5) chose black.  Elliott went into a detailed explanation of osmosis, etc., and they seemed to get it to a certain extent.


The girls were interested to see how the eggs grew when they were in the water.






We put the eggs in cooking oil, and there was no change (we should have used corn syrup).  Then we drained the oil and left the eggs in the cups.  The eggs deflated after we left them in the cups.