Easter Engineering Read More »
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Todays Easter Activity is: Engineering!
If couldn’t already tell, we LOVE STEAM activities in this house. They are fun and educational on multiple levels. We still had some peeps leftover from yesterday, so we decided to get crafty and build some Easter candy structure challenges.
The cool thing about this activity is that you can easily modify it to engage toddlers through teens. Small simple structures and easy explanations for littles and complex structures with hypotheses and in depth engineering analyses for the older kids. Plus, once you build your structure, you can pretend you’re Godzilla, destroying your structures and eating them!
Ingredients & Instructions
These ingredients are super basic, but you can add additional supplies, such as popsicle sticks, glue, string, etc to make it more challenging and complex.
Instructions:
- Teach your child the basic concepts of structural engineering. For my littles, we watched several programs on structural engineering to help get their brains working and to help them easily understand the concepts of what we were doing.
- Talk with them about the materials you’ve selected and outline what they are building (peep nest or jelly bean structures).
- Get their hypothesis on what shapes they think will work best.
- Have them count out their materials and start building.
- Experiment with different shapes and styles. Try just building with peeps and toothpicks. Ask them questions. See if their structure stands up to a weight test (can it hold a peep? How much more could it hold?) Will it survive if you blow on it super hard?
Science Behind The Experiment
This engineering challenge covers multiple STEAM bases:
Science: Kids will explore the design and construction of a jelly bean construction through individual (or collaborative) use of skills in the scientific method: observing, communicating, comparing, organizing, and relating.
Technology: we are doing a digital building competition with For Mommys Dragons
Engineering: Kids will exhibit simple to complex attempts at design and construction.
Art: Kids will design and create beautiful engineering masterpieces.
Math: Kids will explore patterns, patterning, colors, lines, and angles.
What types of structures did your child build? Were they successful? Let us know below!
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Easter is just around the corner, so this week I’m focusing on fun Easter activities. Today I’ll be focusing on edible peep playdough and slime.
The best thing about this activity, is that it covers all the bases: it’s fun, educational, delicious, easy to make, and pretty to look at!
Ingredients & Instructions
Instructions:
- Place peeps into microwave safe bowl and cook for 30-45 seconds.
- Remove from microwave and add canola oil and 3/4 cups of corn starch.
- Stir until the melted marshmallows can be handled. It’s important to stir until the corn starch is completely mixed in.
- Next, dust hands with corn starch and knead until it’s not sticky and easily pliable.
- Get creative. Use cookie cutters to make shapes. Challenge your child to make cool structures, letters, or shapes.
Pro-Tips:
- Almost any oil will work. My two favorites for making this dough are crisco or coconut. Coconut tastes and smells better (in my opinion), but for those who don’t like coconut, crisco makes a great scent free alternative.
- You can also substitute powdered sugar for cornstarch or make one batch with each and have your children compare/contrast.
- If you’re child is more interested in making slime, decrease the corn starch. Around 3 tablespoons should give you a great consistency, however, I reccomend measuring out 1 tablespoon at a time until you reach the desired consistency. Make sure each tablespoon is thoroughly mixed in before adding the next.
- If it’s too sticky, add more cornstarch/powered sugar. If it’s too stiff add more oil.
- Only store this in a baggie or air tight bowl for around 3 days.
- Use fresh peeps. Stale peeps don’t provide the same consistency.
Science & Sensory Benefits
Research shows that sensory play builds nerve connections in the brain’s pathways, which lead to the child’s ability to complete more complex learning tasks. Sensory play supports language development, cognitive growth, fine and gross motor skills, problem solving skills, and social interaction.
Playing with playdough in particular helps little hands improve their fine motor skills, helping improve things like writing. It’s also an amazing tactile experience and gives kids a way to feel unique textures.
The STEAM benefits of this activity are also super awesome:
- Science: How does heating the Peeps change their properties?
- Peeps are marshmallows, and marshmallows are made of tiny air bubbles surrounded by gelatin and sugar syrup (sugar). When the peeps are microwaved, the water molecules in that syrup begin to vibrate and heat up. This process creates steam, and it fills all of the air pockets in the peeps. As the air pockets fill up the peeps expand!
- Technology: What tools do you use to change Peeps into play dough?
- Engineering: What recipe is required to transform Peeps into play dough?
- Art: Which colors are the peeps? What colors can you make mixing them? What shapes can you make?
- Math: How much corn starch is needed to turn Peeps into playdough? How long do the marshmallows have to be heated? What happens if you cook them too long or too little?
Did you try this activity? Let us know your thoughts below!
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