Fizzy hearts!

We love science experiments that use bicarbonate of soda and vinegar. This is an easy one that my pre-schooler loved!

First, I took an ice cube tray (hearts in this case!) and put a little bit of bicarbonate of soda into each heart. I then filled them up with water and put it into the freezer to freeze. Once it was frozen, I got my son to put some vinegar into a small tub.

He wanted to colour the vinegar red, so we added some red food colouring (you could add any colour you like, or none). We then added the hearts to the solution and watched the fizz!

My son thought this was excellent, but he was disappointed that the hearts werent melting fast enough. So we talked about what we could do to make them melt and release more of the bicarbonate of soda. He decided that we should add some hot water, so we boiled the kettle and very carefully added some to the solution. The effect was immediate – the hearts started to melt much faster and release more bicarbonate of soda. This meant more fizz!

I explained some of the science behind the experiment to my son in simple terms. For more, see my post on  Bicarbonate of soda and vinegar: the science behind it.