This is a fun experiment for preschoolers to predict and observe what will dissolve and disappear in water and what won’t. Find out what dissolves in water!
I’ve mentioned before that Henry’s really been into experiments lately.
He’s created his own experiment as well as begs for others to do quite often.
Like I mentioned in the how to become hands on post last week, I go to Pinterest for a lot of my ideas. On a whim when Henry asked for an experiment to do, I checked out my ‘All Things Play’ board and this post popped up: Does it Dissolve? from The Picky Apple.
So we simply set up a dissolve experiment station with stuff from the pantry.
I found a few things in my pantry that might dissolve, along with a few that I knew wouldn’t dissolve:
- Flour
- Sugar
- Brown Sugar
- Orzo Noodles
- Cornmeal
- Oatmeal
- Colored Sprinkles
I started out setting out two pitchers of water to have Henry use each one to predict that it would dissolve or not and pour it in the corresponding pitcher. But right off the bat, he predicted wrong, and realized how hard that was going to be to tell if the next one dissolved or not.
So, instead, I filled up seven different plastic jars with water.
Equipped Henry with a funnel and a couple wooden spoons.
And let Henry have at his experiment.
He predicted before pouring in each one if he thought it would dissolve or not and then observed to see what happened after he stirred for a bit.
He was wrong a lot. And I’m so glad it didn’t upset him.
He did really like when something changed the color of the water, though.
Some changed the color, or made it foggy, but still didn’t dissolve.
And the sprinkles were, of course, the most fun to watch.
They changed the color of the water, but the sprinkles still didn’t dissolve.
I had a hard time choosing what to use for our experiment… I’m curious what other items we’d have to ‘test’ out.
What do you have in your pantry to dissolve?
Henry was 3.5 years old.