What Disappears?

What you need

• three clear plastic cups of water
• a pinch of salt
• a spoonful of flour
• a spoonful of rolled oats
• a spoon

How to do it

1. Line up three clear plastic cups of water.
2. Add a pinch of salt to the first cup and let them stir. Watch it vanish.
3. Stir a spoon of flour into the second and oats into the third.
4. Look closely at each cup: which one disappeared, which one went cloudy, and which one is floating?

Why it matters

Some things vanish in water and some don't, and stirring three cups side by side lets them see the difference for themselves.

What they're learning

Finding out

Trying three things the same way and comparing is how an experiment works.

Describing

Gone, cloudy, floating: new words for what they see.

Stirring

Mixing without splashing takes a gentle, steady hand.

What to look for

Watch for them leaning in to look at the cup from the side.

A tip

Keep hold of the salt pot yourself and add just a pinch, then tip the water away after; it isn't for drinking. Plastic cups stop any breakages.

More like this

Bubble Bath Whisk from 18 months · 20-30 min Drum Roll, Then Hush from 24 months · 5 min Blue Cup Walk from 16 months · 5-10 min Torch Twilight Search from 20 months · 10-15 min