Nappies hold a lot of wee, yet without any intentional questioning from you, it is doubtful your child will ever ask why that is. Never once did my daughter question why nappies could hold a lot of liquid whereas undies certainly didn't! :)
Nappies (or Diapers), are probably the first experience your child will have with absorption and it won't be the last. Cleaning up those puddles of spilt milk etc are just part of everyday life. Here we took a deliberate look at absorption with a simple little activity
Using absorbent materials can be fascinating for children. Just introducing the wonder of a simple sponge and a pool of water can be all the entertainment they need for a time.
So, while we set about testing the absorbency of a couple of different materials, we thought we might as well use coloured water and create some art as well.
Materials: various shades of coloured water, eyedropper, cotton pads (medical or cosmetic work well...check your first aid kid or make up removal) and towelling paper
Using fine motor skills, focus and concentration to transfer water from the container to the cotton pad
She just kept adding more and more water until the cotton pad couldn't handle any more. Look how it bubbled
It was her decision to make each pad a different colour
But look what happened to the cotton pads that were touching! Watching the coloured water travel from one cotton pad to the other was exciting.
Once we'd used all the cotton pads, we tested the absorbency of the paper towelling
We discovered that it wasn't as absorbent which we decided was due to the thickness
It was so much fun watching the colours separate out on the towelling paper and the end result looked fabulous. Many more sheets of towelling paper were used to create lots of different patterns :)
Handy tips:
- To extend this activity try lining the cotton pads up and seeing how far you can get the water to travel along them. Try creating new colours by having 2 primary coloured cotton pads side by side. (eg, a yellow and a blue cotton pad)
- For
younger kids, start this activity by making the coloured water and learning how to transfer water with an eyedropper using
this fun activity
- Let the cotton pads and towelling paper dry out when finished and then reuse them for crafts etc. We used a piece of the patterned towelling paper to help decorate a homemade birthday card. It looked great!
-
Talk with your child about what they are doing. This will help them understand the physical and mental processes they are going through as well as giving them the vocabulary to describe it.
- Use new
language and descriptive words like, "absorption" and "transfer." This will help with their language development.
-Ask
questions to help connect their understanding and use vocabulary to give them words to describe what they're experiencing, eg. "Why do you think this cotton pad is going blue when you haven't put any blue water on it?" etc.
- If you have coloured water left, why not
try making
Cloud Jars?
- For
more fun, have a look
here and
here to see what others have done using similar materials
Debs :)
Look where else we are. Are you following along? :)
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