Getting Creative and Scientific in Kindergarten and Pre-school!
As the school children were partaking in a science project our Kindergarten team decided to get experimental and instill a love for inquiring, experimenting and science within our youngest scientists! Below is a brief description of the fun and interesting science experiments that our kindergarteners conducted!
Red Group
Our Red Group got creative with colour all while exploring the use of their senses.
The children learned first-hand about primary colours and conclusions of mixing colours together. As you can see, this experiment was carried out using water and food colouring which enabled the children to physically see the two colours prior and after the mixing.
An extra element to this experiment included a physical, hands-on approach to learning about our 5 senses. The Red Group had the opportunity to use their senses throughout this activity which was a very fun and practical way to help them understand how special our senses really are!
For this part of the experiment, scented effervescent was used in the water for the children to feel the fizz and bubbles tingling their hands, and also some ‘bath crackles’ were added in for additional fun and for the children to also use their hearing sense! Once this stage of the experiment was completed, the children then had the opportunity to use their sense of smell, by dipping some cotton wool into the now coloured and scented water, and smell the sweet apple and strawberry scents!
Blue Group
Staying on the topic of mixing and getting creative with colour, similarly the Blue Group got experimental with primary colours to explore the outcomes. The group included the story Little Blue and Little Yellow by Leo Lionni to inhance their learning. The Blue Groups choice of instruments for this experiment were paint, brushes and their hands! Below are some photos of the children mixing their blue handprints with their yellow handprints to eventually end up with some green handprints. They also used some creative and free painting to explore what might happen if they were given only two colours, red and yellow, and how they would eventually end up creating a third colour paint to work with!
Green Group
The Green Group chose to conduct an experiment of a different kind, although it too included getting creative with colour! The experiment of choice was changing the colour of a flower from white to blue! Although this may have seemed like magic to them to begin with, it wasn’t long before the children were able to understand the science behind it.
What started out as merely a beautiful white flower in a vase of water, ended up as a blue and white flower before long! In this science experiment, the children learned that flowers need to drink water to survive, and while the white flower was drinking its water in its vase, the children questioned what might happen if they somehow turned the water blue by adding some food colouring!
Like all great scientists they pondered what might be the outcome, and low and behold the flower slowly began to change colour and when they returned to school the following day the scientists had scientifically changed the colour of a flower!
Orange Group
The Orange Group were also experimental with water, putting to the test different items to establish which ones would float and which would sink. A very exciting experiment which incorporates lots of guessing and speculation prior finding out the answers through experimentation. Another water themed experiment which they carried out involved using water, tissue and paint. This was used to help the children to understand that water can move and transfer through things, with the added bonus of witnessing the colours mix together.
Purple Group
The Purple Group decided to explore the seasonal topic of Halloween and chose to begin with a pumpkin. Just like in Cinderella, the children turned a pumpkin into something else!
The children, along with the help of Barbara and Linda, got creative while cooking! They were very hands on in turning their pumpkin into two different things, one savoury and one sweet! The children learned about experimentation and about the versatility of food and in the end had the opportunity to taste their delicious pumpkin soup and pumpkin cake!
Pre-School
The pre-school children, along with the assistance of Janet and Anastasia and the cooperation of the grade 1 teachers and students, have been very busy with a planting experiment!
The children began their experiment with merely a wide selection of seeds; watermelon, sweet melon, tomato, parsley and flowers. They commenced their science experiment by planting the seeds in clear, plastic bags and hanging them on the window ensuring they were able to receive some sunlight. The following step consisted of carefully moving their seedlings to their personalized, hand crafted pots, before then replanting them outside in our greenhouse area to enable them to flourish. The seeds and plants were carefully monitored throughout this entire learning experiment and it will continue after our mid-term break when the plants are big enough and strong enough to be moved to our larger flower beds!
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