Soap Experiments!
We “do science” everyday here at Marvelously Made, in fact, science seems to be imbedded in most of what we do here! Our goal is to challenge the children at school to wonder, to try out lots of new ideas and to see what happens. Young children are mesmerized by all of the miracles around them and we make sure to provide them with the materials and time to explore those miracles.
One of our favorite experiments to do is with Ivory Soap. Do you know what happens if you take a piece of Ivory soap and place in on a paper plate or bowl in the microwave for 45 seconds?
WAIT! If you have not done this before then don’t scroll down! Go to the store and buy a bar of Ivory soap and try it THEN come back here and read the rest of this post – I am serious! You will love it and I would hate to spoil it for you!
Ok, back to the post…
The soap will do this:
Can you believe it?!!
Here are some of the comments from the children in our school when we they saw this happen:
“Wow!! How could that happen? SO amazing! It’s a cloud!!”
“Whoa! Cool! It looks different! It looks like shaving cream. This is so totally cool!”
“First it was a little piece, then it grew into a big giant thing. It’s just so – – I don’t know what it is! In the inside it feels soapy & soft. That’s all I want to say. Can it clean off people?”
“I think it is going to turn into water. It’s getting bigger! It’s going to crush the microwave.”
“Whoa! It’s getting BIG! It looks like a big popcorn. And we can break it apart!”
“Whoa, the soap exploded. It feels like cotton. It makes lots of soap. It smells good! Let’s have some tonight in the bath. It was shrinking…”
So why does soap expand in the microwave?
Ivory soap is known for being “the soap that floats”. It floats because (unlike other soaps) it has a large amount of whipped air in it. The air bubbles actually contain water and when the water is heated in the microwave; it expands! There is a law of science which explains this called “Charles’ Law”. Charles’ Law states that as the temperature of gas increases, so does it’s volume.
So there you have it! As early childhood educators we are able to expose children to dozens of higher-level science concepts through the experiences and experiments we share with the each day.
Like we always say at our school,
“Here we are Learning through PLAY; every day!”