Since we have added water to our new sandbox, the preschoolers have been using their imagination to create different things. They have made some cake, ice cream, pizzas and many other things. One of the things that all the preschoolers get very excited to make are volcanos.
One day Thomas began mixing some sand and water together, then he began shaping the sand and water mixture with Ellis and Sadie, creating a hill. When asked what they were doing they excited stated that they were making a volcano.
As we watched, William came over with a bucket of water. Thomas helped guide William on where to pour the water, then we watched as the water flowed down the side of the mud hill. Thomas explained to everyone that the water was the lava.
Almost every day that we go outside the preschoolers work away on making volcanos. They use their team work and creativity to make each volcano bigger and better, listening to each other other’s ideas and they taught each other what a volcano is, and how they work.
The educators in preschool one decided to extend this play by making volcanos with the preschoolers. We gathered some baking soda, vinegar and plastic bottles and brought them all outside. Then we encouraged the preschoolers to bury the plastic bottles in the sand, ensuring there was still a hole that we could pour stuff in. After the preschoolers used their fine motor skills to bury the plastic bottles, the real fun could begin.
Finley and Axel became very excited as they scooped the baking soda into the plastic bottles, while Ellie enjoyed pouring the vinegar in. Once everything was inside the bottle we had to move away quickly so we could watch the eruption. When we saw all the "lava" coming out the preschoolers began cheering, realizing our experiment had worked.
Once inside we watched a short video on how volcanos work, learning about how a volcano is created to make a pathway for rising hot magma. We also learned how lava is very hot, and we cannot touch it without it burning us.
We wonder if the children in preschool one will want to make a volcano out of paper mâché? Would this volcano have the same reaction as the one in the sand? What might be different about it?
