What Discovery Bottles Have Worked Best ?

[Guest]

Hi

I am looking at using discovery bottles in a lesson observation in Nursery next week - some which I will prepare before hand and others that I will make with the children. So what has worked best for you and with what fillers - sand, water etc. I keep reading about corn syrup but not sure what that is !

The ones I have tried so far and like

1. Water and glitter - lovely effects

2. Water and crayon shavings

3. Coloured water and then add bubble bath

I have tried the following but was not mesmerised !

4. Coloured water and oil - mean to look like waves when you shake

5. Shaving foam and food colouring - didn't really swirl like it said

So any advice appreciated as may do it next week so have weekend to practice

 

Thanks

[Cait]

water and pearlised finger paint

[Guest]

Is that a good effect with the finger paint ? will try it tomorrow in school

 

Any others ?

[Cait]

has to be pearlised, and the swirls in the water are lovely - you only need a tiny bit, in fact we found it out by accident after washing children's hands after fingerpainting, we bottled some of the handwash water!

[Posy]

Iron filings or paper clips and a handily attached magnet

Posy

[Guest]

What filler have you used for the paper clips or iron fillings ? I tried some magnetic letters in sand and it did not work with the magnet ! May have been the bottle that I used !

 

It is hard to find the best ones - could do with a few more

[Posy]

shredded paper worked for us

Posy

[Guest]

I used Lucazade bottles-wide top so easy to fill and just the right size for small hands. Not too expensive for the filling the contents being smaller.

[aliamch]

Clear or light coloured shampoo with marbles, the children are fascinated when the marbles move slowly and don't make a noise like they do in water. Bottles filled with pot pourri or cotton wool with scents or essences on them are good and our children have also enjoyed one filled with loads of tiny toys and objects and rice, they have to shake the bottle to see which object they can uncover. You need to fill the rice nearly to the top of the bottle to make it harder to reveal the objects.

Karrie

[Inge]

our children loved the coloured water and oil, may depend on oil you use we used baby oil as it was clear...

 

tiny bit of washing up liquid in water and food colour, large bottle and shake, you fill the bottle with coloured bubbles.

 

Not quite a discovery bottle to keep but one which is fascinating is a bottle of clear lemonade, cheapest one is fine, and drop in 4 or 5 sultanas or raisins , reseal bottle and watch, they go up and down in the bottle, so remove label to see it!

 

then there is the 3 layer one , an advert on TV at moment, they use honey water and oil, but golden syrup works too

 

we had spider sequins in glycerine and water mix, they moved slower becaise of the glycering, but cannot remmber the ratio of water to glycerine.

 

Inge

[Guest]

I used that nice coloured sand and water, it moved in an amazing way

[Guest]

Yes I saw that advert on the tv and thougt it looked really good - I think it was water oil and honey!!

[Guest]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/cbeebies/nina/make/everydrop.shtml

[Guest]

I feel really silly asking this but what are discovery bottles and how does it work? I am intrigued but never seen/heard of them before?

Tinky

[Cait]

Just plastic bottles full of exciting things for children to discover various things like the properties of oil and water, mixing and settling, think snow globe thingy. But they are cheap to make and you can put anything in - but remember to glue the tops shut!

[Panders]

I used Lucazade bottles-wide top so easy to fill and just the right size for small hands. Not too expensive for the filling the contents being smaller.

 

 

We use Oasis small bottles as they have a wide neck too. Favourite filling has been glycerine and glitter/sequins etc. and the bubbles one. Some children get quite frustrated that they cannot open the lids - we use a glue gun to stick them down with!

[Inge]

for those of you who have not seen or used these magic bottles with the children

 

discovery bottles

 

little book of discovery bottles

 

more bottles on this one go to bottles to make anfd tehr is a drop down list with ideas

 

We had the children make their own and had some interesting results..

 

just remembered one was a milky cream bath which gave a opaque liquid and the children put in creepy crawly toys, they love trying to find them.

 

Inge

[Guest]

Thanks for the last web link Inge. There are some new ideas that I have not seen on there. All the replies have been a great help and I am off to make some today to decide which ones I will use. I will make some up first for the children to explore and then make some together- such as the bubbles one and the oil, syrup and water.

 

I don't suppose anyone has the objectives for discovery bottles - I found it here somewhere but will have to go through all the to find it again as can;t remember where it was

[Guest]

Oh my golly, Cait thats exactly it....i have trawled through this the past hour or so. You are always on the ball. Great ideas girls, absolutely brill tyhanks heaps xxx

[Guest]

POh my gosh, i cantbelieve how many ideas have turned up since i started this thread ten mins ago, i'm jumping with joy. My boyfr can't believe how addicted i am. Thanks again loads and loads everyone. Inge I was lookimg for those pics ofthe bottles aswell.

 

Cant thank you all enough xxx

[Upsy Daisy]

I just wanted to add that I have made some of these bottles over the last few months and I have realised that the drinks bottles are rather heavy for babies to pick up. I tried making some smaller versions from the little bottles you get from the Bodyshop and they work brilliantly, especially the baby oil and food colouring one. The 15 month old loves it.

 

If someone's already posted this, sorry, I missed it.

[Guest]

I think our Christmas craft day will be bottle related- angels from the white actimel bottle sand glitter/snow discovery bottles from small drinks bottles. I'm wondering if we can make large angels from juice bottles?

[Cait]

If you cut the bottom off the bottle it would go on a Christmas tree top!

[Guest]

If you cut the bottom off the bottle it would go on a Christmas tree top!

 

I thought of that but they maybe a bit top heavy? Would it be in bad taste to play angel skittles???

[Cait]

I thought of that but they maybe a bit top heavy? Would it be in bad taste to play angel skittles???

 

 

Haha - no I wouldn't think so - but you could do snowmen - we did that last year and threw 'snowballs' at them scrunched up newspaper covered in cotton wool

[Guest]

Would you have discovery bottles out all year round, and just change the ones you have - or would you only have them out for a week or so?

Never used them before and this sounds a lovely idea

 

Emily

[Guest]

Would you have discovery bottles out all year round,

 

I made ones with magnetic numbers last year with reception. They were on the numbracy basic provision shelves the full year and then at the end of the year we emptied them so the new intake could make their own.

[Guest tinkerbell]

I went on a course where an idea was using pringle containers as instruments,covering them with with nice paper and putting in different things to get 2 different sounds as the top is plastic and bottom metal,if you glue the lids on the childdren can see inside and talk about the different sounds the shakers make.

I have made

rice

money

buttons

crayons

 

.....busy eating ....the children will think of what to put in!

 

it fits well into phase 1 phonics and the children can put the sounds to stories ,music etc

 

Tinkerbell