Make Your Own Melting Witches

by Laura Kane, Education Manager

While at home or in the classroom here is a great way to learn with this easy Halloween themed activity. This activity reaches standards for multiple grade levels and is a great way to have a little educational fun.

WHAT WE'LL LEARN

Melting witches helps us discover a few different scientific principles, including:

States of matter

Chemical and Physical Reactions

Mixtures and Solutions

WHAT YOU'LL NEED

Baking Soda

Water

A bowl to mix the 'dough' in

A tray/something to melt the witch in

Vinegar

MAKE THE DOUGH

Take a cup or small bowl and mix together 1 cup of water with a few drops of food coloring (we like to use a witchy green!)

Place about 1-2 cups of baking soda into a bowl

Slowly add the green water to the baking soda, mixing it constantly, until it reaches the consistency you like. We use a slightly wetter dough so our friends can mold it into shapes if they’d like!

MELT THE WITCH

Take little handfuls of the baking soda dough and place it in a tray. You can make shapes, mold it into a witch, add some googly eyes, or even lay it all flat in the tray and just have fun!

To melt your witch, pour small amounts of vinegar onto the mixture and watch the bubbles!

WITCHY SCIENCE OBSERVATIONS

When you are mixing together the baking soda and water, you are mixing together a solid and a liquid. Many students don’t think about the fact that baking soda is a solid because it is powdery and pours.

What do you see when the vinegar touches the baking soda? Bubbles! When you mix two or more substances together and they make their own bubbles, create their own heat, cool down on their own, or even make their own light, that’s what we call a chemical reaction.

Keep experimenting – How long can you melt the witch? Which will you run out of first? The baking soda or the vinegar? Can you separate the two once they’ve been mixed together?