Magic Powder Experiment

Show your children this magic powder experiment and teach them about surface tension in a hands-on way!

Here is a great activity to show kids you can do magic, but in fact, you are teaching them about surface tension! They get so excited to see that they can also do “magic”. 
 

You will need:

• A bowl
• Water
• Cinnamon
• Soap

Place water in a bowl and pour some cinnamon on the surface.

We first had the little scientists try to make a line or poke a circle on the surface without a soapy finger. Nothing happened.

Then they wet their fingers with a bit of water and rubbed it on a soap bar. Now when they touched the surface a dot appeared or a line depending on what they did. 

First, you get a WOW and then the questions start. Which is great if they want to know why or how it happened. So, for the little ones we said the soap chases away all the small parts of the cinnamon and they run away then you see the clear water. For the bigger kids, we went into a little more detail explaining that cinnamon creates tension in the water and when soap touches it, it breaks the tension and the small parts move away.

When they understood the explanation, they started having fun by making different shapes on it and writing letters on the water. My son thought it will be cool to show it to his friends but he will hide the soap so they don’t see when he places the soap on his finger, then they will really think he can do magic.

Such a fun experiment to do at home! PS: Have you seen this Milk & Soap Experiment?

Contributed by Natasha Joubert