Book Review: Super Simple Science Experiments

Kids of a certain age seem to love science experiments, but it can be difficult to come up with ideas for experiments off the top of your head.

Andrea Scalzo Yi has collected 100 easy setup science experiments you can make with supplies you probably already have in your house in her book Super Simple Science Experiments for Curious Kids.

The book is divided by types of experiments: those involving liquids, solids, gasses, and light, color and sound.

Experiments are rated by simplicity level on a scale of 1 to 3. Materials and instructions are listed, as well as how and why the experiment works and variations you can try.

These projects can be done with parental help even by little kids, but older kids can handle doing some of them on their own.

A random sampling of projects includes:

fluffy slime
making a mobius strip
drinkable density experiment
wall marble run
spinning pencil
potato skewer balance
DIY fire extinguisher
wet and dry painting
make a sunset
sound you can see

Lots of these experiments are classics but there are some you might not have seen before. This book is a great reference for when kids want to do something but you don’t have anything particular in mind. It also allows you to slip in some science whenever you want. You can talk about what kids think will happen when you try different experiments, and because why they work the way they do is included in the book, you’ll be able to explain it to kids even if you don’t remember your own science classes!

About the book: 192 pages, paperback, 100 projects. Published in July 2022 by Page Street Publishing. Suggested retail $22.99. Buy on Amazon.

Several countries have a day set aside to honor and recognize their inventors, but Nov. 9 is a special one that’s known as Tag der Erfinder in German. It’s celebrated in Germany, Austria and Switzerland and it falls on Nov. 9 because that’s the birthday of Hedy Lamarr.

Hedy Lamarr is widely known as an actress but there’s a lot more to her story. You can get a little of it geared to little kids in the Little People, Big Dreams book Hedy Lamarr (32 pages, hardcover, published 2023 by Frances Lincoln Childrens Books, suggested retail price $15.99).

The book explores her birth in Austria and how she spent time when she was young coming up with inventions. She became an actress, married an arms dealer, made her escape to America and became an actress again.

But she also helped develop a frequency-hopping signal device for airplanes that was used by the Americans and their allies during World War II. That technology became the basis for wireless technology such as wifi and GPS.

While Inventor’s Day is a great time to learn about Hedy Lamarr, you can take this opportunity to check out books and do little studies on lots of different inventors. If there’s an inventor or an invention your child is particularly interested in, that’s a great place to start. It’s fun to think about all the things we use every day that didn’t always exist; someone had to invent them!

For a start here at Craft Gossip you can learn more about Garrett Morgan, who invented traffic lights; Maria Oroso, who developed a clay oven that could cook food without electricity; and more female inventors and scientists.

And for more general inventors’ fun, check out this inventors word search from Fun Findery (and another from Let’s Do Puzzles) or take a quiz on inventors and their inventions from Flanders Family Home Life.

Have you read?

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