Author: Maria Busuttil

Here is a simple experiment which you can do with your little ones.

All you need is:

• A large bag filled with icecubes
• salt
• milk – plain or flavoured
• 1 tablespoon sugar
• 1 teaspoon vanilla essence (optional)
• Ziploc bags
• Tea towel

Method:

• Pour a cup of milk into a ziploc bag. Add the sugar and vanilla essence ( or just use flavoured milk ). Make sure the bag is properly sealed.
• Half fill a bigger ziploc bag with ice and add a good amount of salt.
• Put the milk bag into the ice bag and give it a good shake.
• Keep the milk in contact with the ice as much as possible.
• Keep rolling the ice over the milk, the ice in the bag will get VERY cold, so  put a towel around the bag to protect your hands.
• Check the milk after 5 minutes, it should be a similar consistency to ice cream, if not keep going for a bit longer.

WHY DOES ICE CREAM IN A BAG WORK?

Pure water freezes at 0 degrees Celsius. The addition of salt lowers the freezing point by a few degrees ( freezing point depression ). This means when salt is added to the ice in the outer bag, the ice (which is at 0°C) is above its freezing point, so starts to melt. Melting needs energy which in this case comes from the milk mixture in the inner bag. Heat energy is absorbed from the milk making ice crystals form between the tiny fat molecules.

The more salt that is added to the ice, the lower the freezing point. For the ice to melt heat must be absorbed from the surroundings ( in this case the milk mixture ) causing it to freeze.

The ice will feel VERY cold, which is why you’ll need a towel to cover the bag after a  few minutes.

You can also follow this video, with regards to the experiment:

• Food coloring
• Elmer’s / PVA Glue
• Shaving Cream / Foam
• Cereal Box or white cardboard (Kartoncina)
• Cardboard
• Scissors
• Marker
• Paintbrush
• glitters – to act as sprinkles

• Making the puffy paint:
• Mix equal parts of shaving cream and glue in a bowl, until you get stiff peaks in the mixture.
• Divide the mixture into smaller containers if you would like to create different colors, to represent the different ice cream flavors e.g. white-vanilla, brown-chocolate, red-strawberry, green-mint..
• Add food coloring…few drops at a time and mix well.

Puffy Paint Ice cream:

• Cut out a triangle cone from a cardboard and draw lines with a marker.
• Stick the cone on a recycled cereal box or white cardboard.
• Let the children add the ice cream on top of the cone, using the puffy paint and a paint brush – the layer of puffy paint should be thick, so that when it dries, it will remain puffy. Using a teaspoon might help in creating a thick layer and also to distribute the puffy paint.
• Children might also add some glitters on top of their ice cream.
• Leave the ice cream to dry.
• Once ready, you can place the remaining puffy paint in a container for some messy play :).

Fun and Simple yoga session. Children would love it, if you practice these exercises with them 🙂

This is a simple experiment you can do with your little ones, to explain the concept of sun protection.

What you need:

• construction paper
• sunscreen

What you do:

• Put some sunscreen on one of the children’s hands.
• Press the child’s hand onto the paper before it dries, under the section Sunscreen.
• Leave the paper out in the sun, for at least two hours (two hours – the recommended time before applying sunscreen again).

Before:

After:

You can see the difference, the purple of the paper without sunscreen is much more faded.

What does sun damage look like?

When your skin gets damaged by the sun’s rays, it makes even more melanin to try to protect your skin from being damaged even more. That causes the skin to change color:

• Dark-skinned people usually turn darker brown, or tan, when they go in the sun.
• Light-skinned people usually turn more red, or burn, when they go in the sun.

Make sure that you talk about the importance of sunscreen and protecting yourself from the suns harmful rays.

What are the top five reasons you believe everyone should wear sunscreen?

• The ozone layer is depleting and your body needs shielding from harmful rays.
•  Skin cancer rates are on the rise and sunscreen has been proven to decrease the development of skin cancer.
• It helps to prevent facial brown spots and skin discolorations.
• It also helps to reduce the appearance of facial red veins and blotchiness.
• It slows down the development of wrinkled, premature aging skin

For this activity you will need:

• an orange / apple / pineapple
• raisins or any dry fruit of your choice – can also use chocolate chips or nuts
• pretzel sticks

Below, you can find various crafts that you can do with your little ones, related to the sun.

For this craft, you need:

• paper plate or a large circle cut out of a white cardboard/cereal box
• glue
• yellow and/or orange crepe paper – to be stuck on the paper plate
• yellow colored paper – if you do not have, you can ask the children to color on a piece of blank paper with the orange/yellow color – to make the sun’s rays
• Vocabulary: hot, rays

Below, you can find various summer theme tuff tray ideas. if you do not have a tuff tray, there is no need to worry,since you can use storage boxes too.

In some of the ideas, sand is included, but you can also substitute it with semolina, which you can easily find it in supermarkets, it is cheaper than sand and edible too.

These ideas are great sensory activities, and I am sure that children will send a lot of time exploring.

Tip: Do not give the children all the resources at once, but give the children one resource at a time. e.g. day 1: sand and plastic cups, day 2: sand, plastic cups and shells… so that children would not feel overwhelmed with the amount of resources.