Here is another cool experiment that actually works as well in real life as it does on YouTube videos: kinetic popsicle sticks. What does that even mean, you might ask? It is an experiment that uses a lot of popsicle sticks, and interweaves them in such a way that it creates a lot of strain and builds up a lot of potential energy. If you do it in the right way, then after you are done weaving a lot of popsicle sticks (the more you weave, the higher the potential energy gets),

Sometimes, I think to myself that I need to spend more time playing with dry ice. I imagine that this thought is not universally shared, but nonetheless, let’s talk about all the things we can do with dry ice. First, a note of caution: Handling dry ice can be dangerous because it is very cold. Frostbite is a real possibility. Dry ice should be handled carefully, and preferably by a responsible (or semi-responsible) adult. Also keeping dry ice in an enclosed space without adeq

Let’s say you wanted to build a robot, and you wanted to do it on a relatively low budget and accessible to young children. This was my challenge one weekend over the summer, when I decided to robot building at a camp I was working at, with children as young as 4, and with over 500 children (not all at once!) over the course of the week. How should we do it? I wondered, and turned to the wonderful internet for resources. First of all, robots need motors. You can buy real moto

So you are thinking you want to make a rocket…. or maybe not you, but you have an elementary-school aged child who has made rockets, or seen rockets, or dreamed about rockets….and you have no idea where to start. This was the story of my life about a month ago, when my almost 9-year-old child decided he needed to have rockets for his birthday party. He had done rockets at College Gate summer camp. I had seen rockets, and even been part of programs where rockets were made, but

We’re heading to a chess tournament this weekend, scientists, and then our family is on our way to an extended trip in another country for my sabbatical journey! Do not worry, though, readers, I will be back, and in the meantime, co-party facilitators Ben, Dana, and others are still here and still running parties. I am planning some Party Elements events in Israel, though, so if you are in the Tel Aviv area, stay tuned for science events coming your way. In the meantime, thou

So we took a little break from blogging in honor of the first Party Elements science camp, which was at the community center in Sharon, MA last week, and featured exciting experiments such as slime making, square bubbles, testing pH, and much more that we have already featured here on our website. I want to introduce two new experiments that we tried last week for the first time, both of which worked out great! Experiment 1: Color patterns in whole milk. You can read about th

Still summer (although less and less of that now), still looking for things to do with your children? Check out the first five parts of our series (1, 2, 3, 4, 5), or one of our personal favorites, below: Elephant Toothpaste! What is elephant toothpaste, you might ask? Simple! It’s toothpaste for elephants. But for real, it’s a mixture of dish soap, yeast, and hydrogen peroxide that reacts to form a foamy substance that resembles toothpaste for somebody (or something) with ve

How about a puppy, Mommy? Please oh please oh please oh please…Or a kitten? A horse? Goat? No, no, no, and no. There will be no more pets in this house. We have a python, a beta fish, and two aquatic frogs (blog post coming soon on the science of caring for these animals – stay tuned!). But, if you are really insistent on getting a pet in the house, I am willing to be flexible: we can make yeast pets. Yeast pets? What is that? Well, to be honest, it is just yeast, but in this

Hi fellow scientists and scientist-parents! It’s been a little cold recently, so hope everyone is figuring out how to keep kids entertained without our standard pool-beach-lake-pool-beach-lake circuit that we tend to do in our family. You know what I was told before I moved to the Boston area? That there were only two seasons in Boston: winter and July….so, um, yeah. I guess we’re almost done with the July season. Anyway, looking for more things to do with your kids (or yours

It’s hot outside, again. You’ve been to the pool, and the beach, and the splash pad, and you’ve turned on your sprinklers more days that you can count. It’s still hot and the kids are still home from school and they still need things to do. How about trying some science projects? These fun science activities can be done using supplies that you most likely have at home or can get from the supermarket on your next grocery run: 1. Make your own slime or floam. Slime is great. It