Science!

Last year, the summer theme was Fizz! Boom! Read! Normally, we try to get performers for every Friday. Last year though, we had a couple of Fridays we couldn't fill, and so my coworker and I decided to do science project shows those days.  We weren't crazy about doing them every day/every week with our story time, so we decided to do them in two big chunks with these performances.

We started making lists of all the ones we could do, and came up with two categories: weather and food. We scoured the manual and online and came up with as many as we could. We did research and thought we were prepared. Anything can happen in a program though. :)

Weather was the first one we did.  We ordered A LOT of stuff from Steve Spangler's website. One was the Air-Mazing Kit, where we use the balloons to lift a table (even with a kid sitting on it) and we talked about air pressure. We ordered the tornado tube and talked about how they form. We did an experiment with the UV beads and sunscreen, trying out different levels of protection - and then the kids got to do a craft after. Well two.  They got to make a bracelet with the sun beads (which was a challenge unto itself because they would grab the beads, then forget which color was which, and then have to run outside to see). They also got to play with the photosensitive paper. We had mini water guns, shapes cut from microfilm, and all other sorts of things to place on the paper. The guns and the microfilm were great though because they were transparent enough to make designs show through on the paper.

Other than the kids not being able to tell the beads apart, this program went off without a hitch.  We had A LOT of people show up for it, so there was a bit of crowd control issues when it came to doing the crafts, but everyone waited their turn and got to make one and left happy. 

The second one we decided to go with a food theme, I think because there were a lot of those in the CSLP manual. We did things like blowing a balloon up with vinegar and baking soda (that did not go so well). We make "oobleck", the cornstarch and water solution and talked about non-Newtonian liquids and showed them a video from Mythbusters. (Also - did not go so well when the children played with it afterwards and got it EVERYWHERE)  We played smeller's bingo! They had to pass around cups with scented cotton balls and try to guess the scent and mark it (we told them what it was after a minute).

All that wasn't enough though.  The last day or so before the program, I decided we were going to make homemade ice cream.  We had TONS of Crystal Lite containers that one of my coworkers had saved up (she was a former preschool teacher) and donated to us. So I made the milk, sugar, and vanilla mixture the day before and measured it out into baggies. Then the next day all we had to do was put ice, rock salt, and the ice cream mixture into the containers and shake. 

My coworker knew that the mixture needed to stay in the bag. Obviously. I was not specific enough with my volunteer apparently, because I was running smeller's bingo when I heard a parent say "This isn't going to be any good with the salt in it." I had to stop and ask what they meant. I found out that my volunteer had been opening the baggies and dumping the mixture in with the ice and salt. *facepalm*. So I had to round up as many parents as I could and redo theirs, but luckily we had enough.  To any who may have had salty milkwater and disappointed children, I apologize.  Communication is key.