Our first Curiosity Box arrived! The Kickstarter campaign ran a few months back and did rather well getting twice what was needed to continue. Each box has a theme and this one was electricity. Its packed with all sorts of things to experiment with and we had a wonderful wet Saturday of science, mess and discovery. Its a wonderful idea created and put together by Renee Watson and her team from WATS.ON.
Opening the box! Everything you need is included!! Everything is clearly labeled and the instructions and suggestions are easy to follow. Its aimed at 7 to 11 year old children and from an ex Key Stage 2 teachers point of view it hits the mark well with lots of room for extension and fun.
So we started with the main project from the box. We needed to make two types of play-doh like stuff, First we mixed some conductive dough.
Careful measuring is needed.
We added the brown colouring and it turned green !!!!! How did that happen ? Lots more mixing was needed, then we had to heat it. All of the processes have great opportunity for questioning and future side projects.
Lots of mixing and then with a little heat it went from gooey to a firm ball. All very exciting.
We then made some non conducting dough as well, this was much more sticky, but it was also noticed by Worrybomb, the conducting bounced much better than the non.
Fitting the batteries ( even they are included !!! ).
Then following the circuit diagrams, the wires were inserted, LEDs stuck in and… the lights came on !!!
after that success, more were stuck in!
Switches were switched, LEDs fiddled with, short circuits un-shorted etc….
then we stuck some non conductive ( aka the white sticky one ) in between, no short circuit!
Checking the different colours work…
Worrybomb made small bits…
…and big bits.
Although the picture doesnt really show it, but all the lights were on.
Worrybomb Dad had a go, trying to make a glowing eyed Roo, but it didnt work out as well as we hoped, it did light up, but it wouldnt stand up ( tooo sticky in the middle ) and he couldnt get two glowy eyes in ). So is it more of a Cyclops-roo?
Other things insulate as well as hold the conducting dough.
Then we had a go at making a monster card with glowing eyes, using copper tape to make the circuit, Worrybomb made a monster snowman ( when did we last see snow??? ).
Here you can see the copper strips and the battery pack.
Upside down it looked like a skull wearing a dirty chefs hat! I do worry about her sometimes!!!
Then back to the conducting dough!
We also had a play with static electricity with balloons and ping pong balls, but I think the dampness in the air stopped it working as well as it should, so we will try again tomorrow. Again all the things needed other than Dads hair for generation of static were included in the box with simple to follow instructions.
It was great fun and we are looking forward to the next box coming and I have no doubt we will have a pile of bits out again tomorrow to experiment with!