Christmas means red and green and simple fun activities together as a family! One of our all time Toddler Approved favorite activities is Fizzy Drips science. Each year during our 23 Days of Christmas activities series we do Christmas Cookie Cutter Science.
This year for Day 5 of our Family Christmas series we decided to simplify our science fun and leave out the cookie cutters and just add more baking soda! Our Christmas Fizzy Drips Science for Kids was a hit!
M A T E R I A L S N E E D E D
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- squeeze bottles
- vinegar (I buy these big at Costco)
- baking soda (I buy these big at Costco)
- baking pan or large plastic tub
- food coloring
G E T T I N G S T A R T E D
To set up you need to fill your squeeze bottles with vinegar and add in a bunch of drops of food coloring. I used green and red for Christmas science. The more food coloring you add, the brighter the colors!
Next you need to cover the baking pan with baking soda.
This is actually a really fun sensory experience if you use your hands and do it. I had a hard time sharing this experience with my kids because I loved running my hands through the soft cold white baking soda! Ha! It is a neat consistency... different than flour. You don't want to let the kids mess around with it too much because it can start to get dust everywhere and you start inhaling baking soda which doesn't feel so good.
Once all of those things are set up, you are ready to start squirting and creating some fizz!
We practiced squirting from high and low and sideways and so many different ways to see what happened and how to create fizz faster or slower.
It was fun to mix the colors a bit or squirt them right next to each other and watch the colors touch and spread.
The only challenge with this activity is making sure you have enough baking soda, vinegar, and food coloring on hand because the kids want to do this again and again and again.
The squeeze bottles are great for bigs and littles because the more you squeeze them, the more liquid comes out. If you don't squeeze them very much, they'll still drip and drop... so kids who can't squeeze very hard can get liquid out too. They are great for strengthening finger muscles because kids are really motivated to squeeze them hard to get more vinegar out and fizzing!
F O R L I T T L E R T O D D L E R S
For little kiddos who tend to like to eat and touch everything, a plastic tub with deeper sides can help prevent kids from diving in and grabbing the baking soda. Since baking soda and vinegar are both edible, it isn't a huge deal if kids eat a bit of them together, but it doesn't taste good. If my kids try and eat baking soda, I try and redirect them to squeezing the bottles and making the fizzy reactions. If they keep trying to eat the project, we put it away for another day.
I also like to keep other materials nearby to enjoy and explore with... including turkey basters, cups, and spoons. Mixing the colored vinegar and picking it up and pouring it again can be fun.
2 3 D A Y S O F C H R I S T M A S
If you're following along with our 23 days of Christmas series, you can find the whole series on Instagram here (I'm @kristinatoddlerapproved) as we update it each day.
Here's what we've done so far...
Day 1- Wreath making station
Day 2- Cooking Cutter painting (to make wrapping paper)
Day 3- Candy Cane hunt & match
Day 4- Make Giant Gingerbread men
If you do any of the activities, tag them with the hashtag #23daysofchristmas so we can see what you are up to!
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