Spring activities are joyful seasonal traditions. Springtime is often associated with bright and beautiful colors. We love to see the plain, empty trees start sprouting their buds. It’s exciting to see the early flowers bloom and add their color to the world. We even add colors to our springtime holidays, like when we dye Easter eggs. Kids love dipping the eggs into the dye and lifting the colored eggs out of the cups. We can take this enthusiasm for color, and find some new springtime color projects. If you are looking for ways to celebrate the turning of the season at home, here are some fun activities to try.
Science
Learn about acids and bases
Do you know that you can use everyday household substances to learn about acids and bases?
You’ll need 6 clear disposable cups, 6 spoons, water, white vinegar, Sprite, lemon juice, ammonia (skip this one if you’re not comfortable with it), baking soda, and a red cabbage solution.
The red cabbage solution will be your “indicator.” Make it ahead of time by cutting up a head of red cabbage and boiling it in a pot of water for 15 minutes. Strain the cabbage out and let it cool. You can store it in a container or a jar in the refrigerator until you need to use it. See, you just made a pH indicator in your kitchen with cabbage!
When you’re ready for your experiment, set up your 6 cups. You’ll use ¼ cup of each liquid. So in the first cup, there will be ¼ cup of water. In the second cup, there will be ¼ cup of vinegar, and in the third cup there will be ¼ cup of Sprite. Prepare cup 4 with ¼ cup of lemon juice and cup 5 with ¼ cup of ammonia. In the last cup, mix ¼ cup of water with 1 Tablespoon of baking soda.
Now you are ready to test each substance to see if it is an acid or a base. Add 1 teaspoon. of red cabbage juice to each cup. Use a different spoon in each cup to mix the red cabbage juice in thoroughly.
Then watch to see how the substance in each cup changes color. If it turns pink, it is a weak acid, and if it turns red, it’s a strong acid. A solution that turns blue is a weak base, and blue-green indicates a strong base.
Learn about soap molecules
For a simpler science experiment, KiwiCo Corner has this fun and colorful milk swirl experiment to help kids learn about how soap molecules work. It looks so pretty! Watch Rachel and Tree Schoolers episode Happy, Healthy Me! to learn even more about the science behind soap.
Your kitchen could have just what you need for fun spring activities you can do at home!
Art
Spring activities celebrate the emergence of beautiful springtime colors. There is no better time to dive into art projects. Art is an automatic fun spring activity you can do at home. A great way to do something different with color is to use scratch art paper. It has a black coating over a colored paper, and you can get it online or at a craft store. Use a small wooden stylus or an unsharpened pencil to scrape the black coating away and reveal the color underneath. This is far less messy than paint (anyone else cringe when the paint comes out?) and it is still really fun.
If you are willing to get the paint out, you can combine painting with getting outside. Have your kids collect some medium sized rocks and paint them to use as paperweights or as decorations. You can paint a pretty scene on a rock, or paint it to look like a bug or a flower, or anything you want.
For more fun with art, check out our series, Art Time at the TreeSchool!
Crafting
If you and your kids are more into making stuff, try making some tissue paper flowers. The Craft Patch has wonderful instructions here for simple flowers, flowers of different sizes, flowers of different shapes, and even some tissue paper pom-poms. Tissue paper comes in so many colors and is inexpensive. Try some of these fun tissue paper creations for some colorful spring fun.
Learn about spring with My Signing Time
Signing Time Season 2 has a show called My Favorite Season, where Alex, Leah, their frog Hopkins, and host Rachel Coleman take you on a signing journey through the seasons. To access this show and so much more educational programming, try a My Signing Time digital subscription. You can try it with a 14-day free trial here!