Science Experiment-Melting Crayons!

I don't know if you have seen the amazing videos on YouTube for melting crayons to make art but oh my word..they are awesome.  This one happens to be my fav probably because of the Ellie Goulding song playing with it.  I didn't notice the terrible language in the comments until just now!  Mercy YouTube can be tricky to work with in a classroom.  The f word with crayons?  C'mon!

I was looking for a way to amp up my science lesson this week.  We are working on melting and freezing.  I also made a goal for myself over the summer to do more science experiments so what a perfect fit.   I totally teased the kids the day before by telling them, "You cannot be absent tomorrow.  We are going to do the most amazing science experiment!  There were dying to know what but I didn't give in.   

These are the crayons I used to the left.  Notice that it doesn't matter if the paper is on or off.  I tried it both ways.  It also doesn't matter if they are brand new or old crayons or Crayola or cheep-os. Everything works.  I just hot glued them down onto a piece of poster board matching up the ends.  I saved a pizza box from over the weekend to prop the poster board up and catch any mess. 

I moved a little table to the front of my carpet and covered it with black butcher paper to make it look like a real science lab.  I also borrowed the science lab goggles for the kids to wear.  I wish I could post the video of those precious babies in their goggles.  Since I don't have every parent's permission for that I'll post these precious angels.  that would be my baby on the left, Mateo and my nephew on the right Carter.  Ha!  I love it!

Back to the lesson.  I stood at the table and held the hair dryer.  I projected a timer onto the whiteboard behind me so we could see how many seconds it took to start melting. I told the kids if it didn't work we'd stop after 5 minutes.  (trying to build the suspense) It only took about 35 sec. and boy did they LOVE it.  They were so stinkin' excited!  I was repeating that vocabulary like crazy and they were eating it up. 

After the melted wax cooled back down into a solid (do ya like how I threw that science knowledge in there? hehe)  I let the kids touch it.  I added some labels with a sharpie and this beautiful work of art is now hanging on our science wall.  Now how's that for a vocabulary card?  I don't think they'll forget what melting means. 

It was such a success I even had a student teach her parents how to do this experiment that night and they brought it in to show me.  Today another little one did the same thing!  It just makes my heart sing to know they loved a lesson so much they want to do it at home. 

Science + Fun experiments = one great day!