Yesterday John decided he wanted to do an "experiment of science" to make ice. He'd seen such a thing on an episode of "Curious George," plus Pop-Pops had talked to him about how the weather was so cold that water placed outside would freeze.
We filled a foil dish with water, plus a few floating items: almonds, marshmallows, and a candy cane.
We placed it in the planter box outside before bedtime.
In the morning, it was a block of ice!
After touching it for a while, John smashed it up with a spoon. Then John got distracted with breakfast and morning activities, so when he came back to play with his ice, it was
gone! He kept asking me in alarm where his ice was and I showed him that it had melted into water. "But where is the ice?" We went around and around with this question. I think maybe he started to understand it, but still thinks it's rather mysterious. It was pretty fun for me to do this experiment with a child still so young that the concept of water and ice is still completely foreign (and imagine if I told him about steam!).
We filled a foil dish with water, plus a few floating items: almonds, marshmallows, and a candy cane.
We placed it in the planter box outside before bedtime.
In the morning, it was a block of ice!
After touching it for a while, John smashed it up with a spoon. Then John got distracted with breakfast and morning activities, so when he came back to play with his ice, it was gone! He kept asking me in alarm where his ice was and I showed him that it had melted into water. "But where is the ice?" We went around and around with this question. I think maybe he started to understand it, but still thinks it's rather mysterious. It was pretty fun for me to do this experiment with a child still so young that the concept of water and ice is still completely foreign (and imagine if I told him about steam!).
What a fun idea! We've made ice cubes in the freezer to string onto cord to make necklaces before, and Emma gets a kick out of watching the ice turn into water. Will have to try freezing items into a block of ice sometime...alas, it's not cold enough here to do it outside (but maybe next time we go camping...we've had water buckets freeze over on those trips).
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