We're All About Matter Around Here

Hope you all are having a great weekend. We have been so busy in our classrooms! Our students have been making Christmas gifts for their families, we're so thankful for our volunteers who help us with this one, definitely couldn't do this activity without their help! Our Christmas classroom celebrations are all planned and we're looking for a fun filled Friday with a school wide sing-a-long! LOVE this time of year!

Anyhow, matter has been our science focus this month and we wanted to share some ideas and freebies with you all!

After reading a book about matter to our first graders, we completed a vocabulary building activity. When we introduce new vocabulary to our kiddos we usually complete a worksheet like the one below. Our first graders put these worksheets in their writing binders and refer to them when needed. If you'd like a copy of the worksheets below, just {CLICK HERE}.

After a lengthy discussion about solids, liquids, and gasses, we did a little experiment about solids and liquids with our first graders. It was SUPER easy and they were just thrilled! We showed our kids how liquid takes the shape of it's container by pouring water from a pitcher {cylinder shaped} to a rectangular shaped container.

Next we explained that a solid is different from a liquid because it does not take the shape of the container in which it is placed. We used several classroom objects, like the tape dispenser shown, and again they were lovin' this experiment!

Finally we told them that we can take a solid, turn it into a liquid, and then back to a solid of a different shape. They were seriously amazed! We took a container filled with ice cubes, let it melt throughout the day, and it turned into a liquid. The next day we poured the liquid into a new mold {heart shaped} and turned the liquid back into a solid by freezing it. The kiddos will see our result next week, and we're sure there will be excitement!

We also like to display our science vocabulary cards near our science table. You can get a copy of our matter vocabulary cards {HERE}. See below for a picture.

We hope you all have a great week! If you teach matter we'd love to hear activities that you do with your kiddos. Just comment below!