Magic School Bus Science Club: Acids and Bases

My kids are Magic School Bus freaks. You don't believe me? Well...my two year old walks around saying, "According to my research..." before making statements. And my four year old often says, "What are we gonna do? What are we gonna do? What are we gonna do?!" When something slightly dramatic happens. And the first time my five year old ate a Hostess Ding Dong, he called it a Mallow Blaster. :) And all of my kids say, "To the bus!" when I tell them to get in the car. In fact, if I give them the choice between watching a Disney movie and a Magic School Bus episode, they pick Magic School Bus every time. But I'm good with it though, because along with all the funny sayings and silly jokes, my kids are actually picking up some awesome science concepts.

Needless to say, when I heard that there was a Magic School Bus Science Club that we could join, I knew we had to do it. Basically it works like this: you go to their website and pay to be a club member for a year. Then, the send you one Science kit every month for 12 months. Inside the kits are materials and instructions that you need to complete about six different experiments having to do with that month's theme. All the experiments are kid friendly. It's so cool!

Our first kit came this week. This month's theme is acids and bases. For experiment #1 the kids got to determine which of five edible substances were acids and which were not based on if they tasted sour or not.

For experiment #2 we had to boil some red cabbage and strain off the water. Then we divided the cabbage water into six different cups. Then we took the six cups of edible liquids (vinegar, baking soda mixed with water, lemon juice, cola, water, and lemonade) and using a pipette dripped drops of the edible substances into the cabbage water. The substances that were acids turned the water red or pink. The substances that were bases turned the water blue or green, and with the substances that were neutral the water stayed violet. It was fun. And the boys really enjoyed it.

Ollie and Del woke up from their naps before we had time to do any of the other experiments. So we'll be doing the last four later this week. I read ahead in the directions though, and it looks like we'll be using Litmus paper to determine which liquids are acids and bases, copper plating a nail, and using acids to clean off dirty pennies. It's gonna be great. I love science!