Spielideen Englisch 27. Mai 2020 · AK

Ideas for games at home:The things that water can reveal

Water can do surprising things - for example, water can make colours appear. Crazy, right? We will show you exactly how this works here.

An experiment from the FRÖBEL-kindergarten Farbkleckse from Hürth.

This is how it works

First look at the filter paper and hold it against light. The filter paper has many small holes and can absorb a lot of water. This is exactly why it is ideal for this experiment.

Step 1

Draw lines or circles on the filter paper with various water-soluble pens (fineliners, felt-tip pens or non-permanent markers).

Step 2

Now place the painted paper on a plate and drip a few drops of water onto the painted lines.

What can you observe? The water is being absorbed by the filter paper and blurs the black colour. And not only that! Suddenly other colours appear!

 

Why is that?

Black markers are not made from black paint by the manufacturers, but from a mixture of different colours. Together they produce a particularly strong black. Each manufacturer uses a different colour composition. So black is not just black.

The water now does something with the colour: it separates the colours and these are "carried away" by the water when the water passes through the filter paper. Some colours move faster and further, others slower.

(Adult knowledge: What happens here is called color writing, or chromatography, and is an important process in chemistry for separating a mixture of substances into its individual parts)

Material:
  • Filter paper, for example a white coffee filter
  • Water soluble black pens (also called non-permanent)
  • Pipette or something else that allows you to drip controlled water onto the paper
  • Water
  • A plate