This month at RisingOaks Early Learning | Saint John Paul II, School-age 1 engaged in the magic of science by using baking soda, turmeric, and hand sanitizer to make invisible ink. How it works is water and baking soda, which is an alkaline and neutralizes with acids, reacts to the hand sanitizer and turmeric (pH indicator), turning the baking soda red. As the children tried the experiment, they used the baking soda and water mixture as paint, writing their name, before taking the hand sanitizer and turmeric solution to paint over the baking soda solution, watching as their name began to show in red. As this happened, we talked about how a chemical reaction was happening between the baking soda and hand sanitizer. Charli as she watched her name appear screamed, “it’s glowing!” Audrey was surprised saying, “what’s happening?” Some children were confused in the beginning as they used the baking soda solution, saying “it’s not showing up!” However, when they used the hand sanitizer solution they noticed that as they brushed over a section of their paper a few times that gradually the colour started to show. Eli noticed that the more he painted over a section the darker the colouring showed up. The children also noticed a smell as they were beginning to paint. Kinley asked, “what is that smell?” When I told her it was hand sanitizer, she recognized the smell right away and agreed. Her peers around also took another sniff and agreed with Kinley. The children all had a look as their peers did their own writing wanting to see the experiment more then once.
