Volcano

This was a project from quite awhile ago that I never posted.  It was an "extra" for one of my 2nd graders who is a bit more "artsy" than the other and he was here for the morning but the other had an appointment and I really didn't want to go to much further ahead.  Life is much easier when they are both on the same lessons.  :-)

Throughout Literature2 and History2 they were learning about the Roman myth and the Hawiian Legend of the volcano.  So I printed up a picture and the "story" for both of those for either side of the mountain.  In the plume at the top is a little pocket where we placed his "How a Volcano Erupts" booklet. You can find this booklet "coloring page" at Crayola.

 

By the time he finished with the inside of the volcano, he really didn't want to do much with the outside or the plume of smoke.  It was more of a "for fun" activity so that was just fine.  :-)  This was made out of 2 pieces of brown 12x18 construction paper and a gray sheet for the smoke.

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Around that same time we explored with baking soda and vinegar reactions (they had all done clay volcanoes using this concoction before so we just played around with colored vinegar and baking soda on a tray).

 

We also explored with that more "realistic" volcano eruption that was going around on Pinterest.  :-)

I used a candle warmer to melt wax on the bottom of a mug (dollar store had candle "cubes"...worked perfectly) and covered with sand.  (By the way, we are still using the mug...it was unharmed.)  We did try to do this experiment on the candle warmer but it didn't work.  So then we put the mug in a frying pan right on the stovetop.  It took a lot longer than I thought it would but it was kind of neat to watch as the wax started melting and started making streaks through the sand and eventurally one came to the surface..then another, then another!  :-)  Fun stuff!