Pipette

Plenty of science happening in the atelier... with the very simple means..

small pipettes
absorbant paper
jars of water with the insides of old felt tip pens that had stopped working (a great way to get that last colour out)

The children learned about expelling the air from the pipette and how the coloured water would then climb up the pipette instead of air... and that you could move the pipette without it dripping until you squeezed it. There was no testing out tiny drips... it was all about full on squeezing...

We then watched the liquid move across the absorbant paper as it soaked up - which edge would it come to first... how did the colours mix, and how much water could the paper hold without dripping - or finding a small pool under it...?

This was a very popular activity for sure - and the children enjoyed watching the process as much as participating...

... and of course this offers a great opportunity for developing fine motor skills...

you can see the inside core of the old pens in the jars of coloured water... I save all the pens, so I can top up the colours when needed...

my favourite bit of this photo is seeing how the child observing has her head bent down low so she can watch how the colour comes out of the pipette

experimenting to see how it works...

they got very wet as squirting was fun... there was a long line to try this out... and as I was introducing this material on a busy and chaotic afternoon to find collaborate focus I did not want them to be all doing it at the same time, I wanted them to watch each other and observe and interact... each child got  to create two squirt art pieces... the first to see what happens and how it feels like and the second to have a go with more awareness. When I set this up tomorrow it will be availabe for several children at the same time (just need to find some more trays...)