Tag: fizzyplay

Posted on

Pond Fizzy Play Activity

We’ll be doing some play on the topic of ponds this week. I think it will tie in nicely with Earth Day coming up on April 22nd.

To start off, we did a pond fizzy (potion) play activity. My kids love activities involving fizzy reactions, so we do them often.

pond fizzy sensory activity

I usually make my own fizzy powder because the kids go through a lot in one activity. My 3 year old tends to dump entire containers of fizzy powder into the water. To manage this impulse, I put the powder in small containers and refill them throughout the activity.

I prefer fizzy powder recipes that use citric acid powder – so you can just add water to create a reaction. However, baking soda and vinegar will give you the same reaction. The recipe is simple and very forgiving. The measurements do not need to be exact. I will usually just eyeball the amounts of each ingredient.

Fizzy Powder Recipe

*As an Amazon Affiliate I earn from qualifying purchases.

If you don’t have Bubbling Epsom Salt, but want to still create a long-lasting, bubbling mix – you can use cornstarch. I have more information on making fizzy/ potion powder with cornstarch in this post.

To add something extra to this activity, I made it look like a pond, so we could talk about creatures that live near ponds. I also included some blue and yellow water, so the kids could try some colour mixing. For fine motor work practice, I put out a variety of tools including pipettes, tweezers and scoops.

The kids had a great time with this activity. They loved the added texture of the grass under the water and of course, scooping, mixing and pouring the ingredients. It sparked a lot of conversation about the animals and creatures who live around ponds.

diy cattails in play pond
bowls with coloured water for mixing

Other Materials

  • Yello Door Education Rustic Pourers (Sewing Seeds Play – save with code HOUSEOFPLAY10)
  • Lovevery colour tablets for blue and yellow water, tweezers & pipettes
  • Resin containers (Playspiration – Instagram)
  • Schleich animals
  • DIY Cattails (skewers & corks painted brown)
  • Fake grass mats, green stones, moss, flower (“lily pad”) sequins, glass pebbles (Dollarama)
Posted on

Winter Ice & Fizzy Sensory Tray

ice ring play fruit and evergreen
frozen ice tuff tray
ice and fizzy sensory tray

The activity

We repurposed part of our last Winter Sensory Play Tray for this activity. The kids weren’t quite ready to let go of the last activity and I like to save effort and repurpose activities when I can. So, I put the tray with the ice slide and fake snow back outside to refreeze and brought it back in when we were ready to do this activity.

I made an ice ring with frozen fruit and evergreen sprigs and some fizzy powder (recipe here). I added warm water, salt and scoops, pipettes and bowls. The kids decided to bring in some winter animals and loose parts.

Review of this activity

Overall, we found this activity to be mediocre. There were some fun elements to it, but some misses as well. Here was our experience

Enjoyment – Medium

The kids always like a fizzy activity, so they jumped into mixing the fizzy powder and water right away. They played with the tray on and off for about 5-6 hours and the play evolved from fizzy play, to melting ice, to making soup, to small world play. However, they found the fruit and evergreen ice ring confusing.  They weren’t sure what to do with it and because it was difficult to get the fruit out of the ice, they lost interest in it quickly.

Learning – Low

We’ve done quite a few fizzy activities, so the science wasn’t new to them. We talked about how salt and warm water can melt ice and the kids found that interesting. Most of the learning from this activity involved fine motor skills and hand-eye coordination from working the pipette. So, for us this tray didn’t have a big learning component. That could explain why the kids didn’t find it highly engaging.

Cost – Low

We reused the ice slide and the fake snow from our last Winter Tray activity by storing the tray outside and the ingredients for the ice ring and the fizzy powder were things I had in my cupboards, fridge and freezer. The citric acid powder for the fizzy powder is inexpensive on Amazon and I’ve had the container of bubble bath for over a year – you only need a small amount.

Effort – Medium

There’s weren’t any special skills were involved in setting up this activity, just some planning ahead. I prepared the ice ring a day in advance and the fizzy powder just before doing the activity. The large tray is excellent for containing mess, so there was nothing to clean up on the ground after. The most challenging part of clean up was maneuvering the tray over to the sink to pour out the water (I definitely needed my husband’s help). There was a little spillage in the process, but thankfully water is easy to clean up. That’s why it’s one of my favourite sensory elements for kids activities.

sensory play with ice and fizzy powder

Final Thoughts

I had a few learnings and take aways from doing this activity. I think it would be a good activity for a weekend, or any day when you can leave it out for a few hours. The lack of messiness definitely helped make this possible.

I wouldn’t repeat this activity again in the same way.  I really needed to allow a lot of time for the ice to melt in order for the kids to get the most out of it. It took a few hours for the ice to start melting enough to get fruit and evergreens out, even with the help of the salt and water. The kids didn’t have enough patience to stay engaged that long. Next time I make an ice melting activity, I would make the ice thinner – so it’s easier for the kids to melt.