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You're a parent or grandparent who wants to keep your little kid busy and active with a bend towards learning something about science-not necessarily from just the movements of their favorite video game warrior (especially if you want your TV back). This simple experiment that you can help them with teaches them about the properties of metals and their reaction to simple household chemicals (something you could teach them along the way). This simple experiment could also lead to some nice bonding between you and your little charge.

Get a bunch of dull pennies, a quarter cup of white vinegar, a teaspoon of salt, a shallow clear plastic bowl, some water and a roll of paper towel (your little ones helping you assemble them). This experiment starts with you and/or your little ones pouring salt and vinegar into the bowl. Note how dull the pennies can be unless they are absolutely brand new (don't use them). This dull look, you can explain, is caused by oxidation-the reaction of certain substances, living or not, to the air. A more common example of that is a pear turning brown and soft from the exposure to air. Oxidation can also affect humans-not adversely as fruit-but can still cause complications to the human body such as heart disease and cancer, if the right anti-oxidants (vitamins) are not taken. Gently place the pennies in for five minutes; little ones don't want vinegar into their eyes.

You are going to show these kids how this simple chemical combination of vinegar and salt will initially react with the dull buildup on copper, cleaning the copper oxide, and then later you can show another chemical reaction by not rinsing the salt-vinegar combination off a select group of pennies. This reaction called 'verdigris' is when the salt/vinegar combination causes a reaction between the copper and the oxygen in the air (another chemical) turning the copper oxide aqua-marine. The other group of pennies that you and your little ones will rinse off show no such reaction, but over time will return to their original dullness.

This simple little experiments will help teach the little ones something about science and help bring you a little bit more closer to them in the process!

Learn more about this author, Todd Daigneault.
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