Awesome Fizzing Sidewalk Paint

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Chances are that if you are a regular reader here, you’ve got a little one in your life and you enjoy finding new activities and crafts to do with them.  Hey, me, too!

That’s why I was super excited to come home from our little trip to discover this awesome book waiting for me!

101 kids activities that are the bestest, funnest ever by Holly Homer and Rachel Miller 

 (I received a copy of 101 Kids Activities for review. All opinions are 100% mine. There are Amazon affiliate links in this post.)

101 Kids Activities That Are the Bestest, Funnest Ever!: The Entertainment Solution for Parents, Relatives & Babysitters!is jam-packed with great activities and crafts that are guaranteed to keep the cries of “I’m bored!” at bay.

As if that isn’t enough, the pictures are beautifully done and each activity comes with modifications for both younger and older kids.  Love that!

The kids were as excited as I was when they saw the book, and in no time we were outside trying out the Fizzing Sidewalk Paint.

 Fizzing Sidewalk paint recipe

From 101 Kids Activities by Holly Homer and Rachel Miller, printed with permission of Page Street Publishing June 2014

This activity trumps ordinary sidewalk chalk with a little science magic by creating a chalk-based paint and then spritzing on a little fizz. It all starts with pH. When solutions that are pH base mix with an acid, action happens!
Materials
+ Large mixing bowl
+ 1 (1-pound [454 g]) box baking soda
+ ½ cup (63 g) cornstarch
+ Warm water
+ Several containers to hold the paint
+ Food coloring
+ Paintbrush(es)
+ Spray bottle filled with vinegar—1 per child
+ Buckets for cleanup
In a large mixing bowl, mix the baking soda and the cornstarch together. Add the warm (almost hot) water, stirring until it is the consistency of pancake batter. Split the recipe into several containers, adding the food coloring color of your choice to each.
Use the homemade paint to create a scene or flick it with a paintbrush into a modern masterpiece. It is best to work fast because the paint dries quickly (but can always be diluted with the addition of more warm water).
Once the painting is in place, it is time for something a little extra. Spray the artwork with the vinegar-filled bottle and watch what happens. Your artwork will sizzle and pop!
About Cleanup
A bucketful of water splashed across the art can make it disappear. Because that is fun, too, you might not want to wait for rain.
Modifications for Younger Kids
If a paintbrush is hard to negotiate in the paint, give your children a spoon and let them drip or drop spoonfuls of paint onto the pavement. For the little ones, be sure to fully supervise when they spray vinegar. It can sting little eyes.
Modifications for Older Kids
This activity is an easy way to work in a lesson on reactions between acids and base chemicals and talk about why this works. Maybe you can have your budding scientists adapt the recipe to see whether they can get bigger bubbles and more fizz in their next batch of paint.

TIP
Do you have a prewriting preschooler? Use a turkey baster to squirt vinegar at the paint. The grasping and squeezing helps strengthen finger muscles they will use when they are writing.

How we played with the Fizzing Sidewalk Paint

We chose to make three colors of sidewalk paint:  green, purple, and red.  (The possibilities are endless since it only takes a few drops of food coloring to create each color!)

fizzing sidewalk paint directions

 

We opted for the spoon approach instead of grabbing the paintbrushes.  The kids LOVED using their spoons to drip the paint in swirls, puddles, and other shapes.

 

painting with fizzing sidewalk paint
They also enjoyed feeling the paint with their fingers, finding that although it looked quite wet and squishy, when they pushed on it with their fingertips it felt solid.  (Remember our gak experiment?)
Once they used all the paint up, it was time to make the artwork fizz!
We discovered our spray bottle wasn’t working (bummer!), but once we poured the vinegar into a small squirt bottle they were having a blast!
fizzing sidewalk paint
The kids and I can’t wait to try out some of the other wonderful ideas in the book this summer!   Want to check it out for yourself?  You can get your own copy of the book today on Amazon!
And, if you are looking for more fun outdoor activities for summer:

 

Comments

  1. When I see neat things like this I wish I was a kid again or at least that my kids were still young enough to play with things like this!

    • It was! I was sad that we ran out of vinegar before we got to cover all our painted area, but we got a big gallon of it at the store for next time! 😉

    • I love easy to put together activities! And clean up was easy, too — just hosed it off. 🙂

      Definitely recommend the book!

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