martinzoo

In our Christmas Unit, I have an activity that went right along with the chemistry that we’ve been learning for the past 4 months.

Yesterday, GB kind of had a mini-meltdown. It doesn’t happen often. And it was probably because his blood sugar was low. But it also could have happened because he hasn’t been stimulated mentally for at least a week. We’ve kind of put educational activities on hold until after Christmas. But you know, I was worried that he actually NEEDED something educational.

So when Dana emailed me this morning to ask me a question about this activity, I realized that we never got to this activity last year. So why not do it today? I have all the items needed, and it won’t take too long. And it may actually help. So we did it. And it was so fun that even Jabem was helping.

North Pole Bureau Of Investigations
Case #1225: Case of the Christmas Cookie Mystery

The teacher’s edition can be found here.

The setup: each petri dish has one white powder (baking soda, baking powder, corn starch, flour, powdered sugar, and baby powder.) The small bowls have the mystery mixes (bowl #1 = corn starch, flour, and sugar - bowl #2 = baking soda, flour, and sugar - bowl #3 = baking soda, flour, and baby powder)

Using a towel to protect my counter, we tested each white powder with water, vinegar, and iodine, to see what kind of chemical reaction we got.

GB is applying iodine to baking powder in this photo.

In this photo we are using heat to figure out what kind of reaction heat will cause to our powders.

This was the sheet that we recorded our results on. From the chemical reactions, GB was able to figure out that mixture #2 was the mystery cookie mix because the flour showed starch with the presence of iodine, the baking soda bubbled after vinegar was added, and the sugar bubbled with heat.

Really, this is a great experiment. And it fit very well with what we’ve been doing. Of course, you know where this experiment had to end, right?

Have you ever been to a White Elephant party? You may also refer to it as a Chinese gift exchange, which is the way I’ve always referred to it as.

Our homeschool group’s moms met the other night for a fabulous dinner, sans children. Each of us brought a white elephant gift. I won’t say what I brought, because it may have come from one of my readers. But we had a great time. We talked a lot about homeschooling strategies, our children and our hubby’s weird habits. I really won’t dwell on this subject… you know how ladies are when they get together…LOL!

Back to the White Elephant party, essentially, each person brings a re-gift item that they don’t want, or something silly, or something great, but not something expensive. The whole point is that someone’s trash may be someone else’s treasure. We put all the presents on the table, drew numbers for the order to choose a gift. The first person chooses any gift on the table and unwraps it. The second person can either steal the first person’s gift or choose another gift that is unknown. The third person can choose an unknown gift or either of the gifts that came first. If someone steals your gift you choose another, and that gift is yours unless it is stolen from someone else. You keep going until all presents are unwrapped and parceled out. A gift can only be stolen twice.

Out of eight ladies, I got to go 6th. The second lady unwrapped some lottery tickets, which turned out to be the gift that everybody wanted. So it got stolen by lady number 5, and ME! So that’s what I got. Very fun!
When I got home, I let GB scratch off all the parts of the lottery tickets which he enjoyed. And we ended up with a whopping $12.00 win!

Check out his concentration!