What Do You Mean, Oil and Water Don’t Mix??!

 

Sometimes, my planned activities go so hilariously “wrong” – and still E has fun and enjoys her very own spin on things.

Recently, I was trying to do a colored water and oil activity like Growing a Jeweled Rose did as part of their Liquid Lab Experiments. It shows that oil and water don’t mix, right? Well, tell that to E 😉

 

 

 

 

I set it up all nice and pretty. {We used left-over egg dyes from Easter, btw. I’m always happy to find ways of putting them to good use rather than just pour them down the drain.}

 

 

E came to the table with a big grin of excitement and got right to work with the pipette.

 

 

And that’s about as far as we proceeded with MY plan – from then on, it was E’s way all the way 😉

She mixed the water and oil with her hand

 

 

 tried to wash off the oily residue in the colored water,

 

 

 and spilled water and oil, then cleaned them up again.

 

 

When she was done, the oil and water hadn’t REALLY mixed, of course, but due to the dye bleeding into the oil, it sure was hard to tell for a toddler 😉

 

 

 

 

Not to be deterred, I set up the same thing again the next day, when E asked to use the egg dyes again. This time, E proceeded differently but still nowhere near MY plan: She dumped all the colored water into the bowl with the oil, then explored the pipette and its effects on the swirls in the liquid for a while.

 

 

Finally, she wiped the little bowls clean and announced she was done.

 

 

I couldn’t help but grin throughout this activity, I really thought it was hilarious.

 

All told, this was a lovely sensory and fine motor activity properly using the pipette for the first time – and we’ll simply save the science aspect for another time 😉

 

 

 

Which of your toddler activities have gone differently than you’d expected? How did you react? Leave a comment!

 

 

 

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