Silly Putty Saturday Science in the Park

We are still organizing and recovering from our move, but I wanted to keep up the momentum with Science Saturdays in the park. I didn't want to miss August (it seemed like everyone scheduled something for Saturday, August 25th, including me). We squeezed it in during the morning (sorry to those I promised that it would happen in the afternoon - my afternoon was pretty jam packed) in a different park than normal (they upped the reservation fees at the park we were using).

I decided to keep it simple and do something easy, fun, and I know works: silly putty!

I was busy baking a koala summer cake Friday night for Saturday afternoon's event that I didn't get the chance to write up the recipe for the table. I did get plastic tablecloths though for this event since the silly putty picks up everything and park tables are filthy! I thought on the fly and wrote the recipe with Sharpie on the table cloth. It worked nicely! I didn't even have to worry about taping down paper or paper getting wet and messy (this was a super messy event). Before you start, have plenty of wipes handy.

The ingredients that you add to a zipped baggy:

Once in the bag, zip the bag, and shake, squish, and knead:

Some were over excited and wanted to experiment to see what happens if you mix all of the colors:

You get a poop color

Once the white in the bag is mostly gone, take out the putty and continue to squish, knead, stretch, and pull in your hands until it becomes silly putty texture.

Place the silly putty in a clean bag to take home!

Some discussion points:

• How does the silly putty feel? You can ask this at different stages of this project.
• What do you think will happen when we mix glue and starch? Do you think something new will be made?
• What are we using to measure the ingredients? We use less starch than glue (about 1/2 as much) - bring up fractions if you think your kid would like the introduction.
• What are the different colors?
• What do we get when we mix colors?
• What happens if we place silly putty shaped in a ball on the table for a few minutes?
• What happens if we pull the silly putty slow?
• What happens if we pull the silly putty fast?
• Does silly putty bounce?

** It seems as though an email list from Lego Race Cars in the park was shredded before I got to put the names on the email list. If you thought you were on the email list but didn't get the email about Silly Putty this past weekend, please use the email on the left side navigation bar to let me know. Also, if you haven't had the chance and want to be on the email list, please let me know too!