Required Materials:

• Pipe cleaners
• Bubble liquid

Optional (but Recommended) Materials:

• Pony beads (to make a patriotic one choose red, white and blue beads)
• A cookie cutter (to make a patriotic one try a star-shaped cookie cutter)

Directions:

1. Wrap the pipe cleaner gently around the cookie cutter until the pipe cleaner is molded into the shape of the cutter (note: if it loses its shape at any point, simply place it back on the cookie cutter to get the shape again!).
   1. If you don’t have a cookie cutter just carefully shape your pipe cleaner.
2. Attach a straight pipe cleaner onto the shaped one; now you’ve made your wand!
3. Add the pony beads to your wand in any pattern you would like, and secure them at the bottom by looping the last bead around the pipe cleaner. This step is just for looks – you can skip it if you don’t have beads!
4. Ask your parent for a small bowl with some bubble solution and enjoy a day of bubble blowing in the summer!

Activity by Stephanie Zafferano, Fiske Site
Photo Credit & Inspiration: www.iheartcraftythings.com

Materials Needed:

• 1 gallon Ziploc bag
• 1 quart Ziploc bag
• 1 cup milk
• 1 tablespoon sugar 
• ½ teaspoon vanilla 
• ⅓ cup salt 
• ice 

Directions: 

1. Pour the milk, sugar, and vanilla into the smaller quart-sized bag.
2. Fill the larger gallon-sized bag ¾ full of ice, then add the salt to the ice.
3. Place the smaller bag inside the larger bag and close the seal; make sure you close them both tightly!
4. Now shake the bag good and hard for 5 minutes.
5. Rinse the small bag off with cold water before opening up to keep the salt water from getting into your ice cream.
6. Enjoy!

Activity by John Bradley, Floating Teacher
Recipe Source: www.food.com

What’s the best day to fly a kite? Winds-day!

Materials:

• Paper lunch bags
• Streamers/ribbon/anything that can blow in the breeze
• Hole punch
• Sturdy string
• Markers, stickers, etc. to decorate the kite
• Tape

Directions:

1. Decorate the paper lunch bag as you would like, using the stickers, markers, etc.
2. Open the bag and use the hole punch to make 2 holes on the open side of the bag.
3. Loop the string through the 2 holes, and tie it tightly.
4. Add streamers to the other end of the closed bag using tape or glue, or even hole punching them through.
5. When flying the kite, hole the string and make sure the bag is open to catch the air.

Activity by Stephanie Zafferano, Fiske Site
Photo Credit & Inspiration: www.somewhatsimple.com

Materials:

• Cardboard frisbees (see how to make them below!)
• Sticks (these will be placed in the ground to mark the hole)
• Cones/something to mark off the tee box (the starting point)
• Small pieces of paper, you will write numbers 1-3 on them.

Making your Cardboard Frisbee:

1. 2. 3. 4.

How to Play:

1. In your backyard, take your small sticks and place them in a parent or guardian approved spot. Mark them with a ‘1’, ‘2’, or ‘3’.
2. The ‘1’ should be closer to the tee box, but not to close. The ‘3’ should be the farthest away. The ‘2’ should be in the middle.
3. Move back to the tee box where you will take your frisbees from earlier and toss them towards the first hole marker. 
4. If you hit the stick marking the first hole, you just got a hole in 1, congrats!
5. If you miss, go to where your frisbee landed and try again. Keep going until you hit the stick marking hole 1. Record your score.
6. Go back to the tee box and go for hole 2 and then hole 3.
7. You may need to use the smaller cardboard frisbee for shorter shots or larger for longer ones. You will figure that out as your play.
8. Move the tee box and the holes around to keep the fun going!

Activity by Stephen Pfaff, Floating Teacher

Materials Needed: 

• Computer paper
• Shaving cream
• Food coloring
• Fork
• Shallow pan large enough for your paper
• Paper towels 

Directions:

1. Using a spoon, spread a thin layer of shaving cream around the bottom of the pan. All you need is a shallow coating.
2. Dot the surface of the shaving cream with food coloring.
3. Run the tines of a fork through the colors in a wavy fashion. Try not swirling your colors or else they will run together. 
4. Lay your paper on top of the colored layer in the pan. Smooth the paper out of over the shaving cream. 
5. Wait thirty seconds.
6. Remove the paper and wipe the shaving cream off with a dry paper towel. If you do this carefully, none of your colors will run or be distorted. 
7. Allow your paper to dry. If it curls you can have an adult iron it flat using low heat. 
8. Now you can wrap gifts with your own decorated wrapping paper!

To learn more about the science behind this art project, check out ScienceFun.org!
To learn more about Eric Carle’s art, check out the Carle Museum’s website.

Activity by John Bradley, Floating Teacher
Photo Credit & Inspiration: www.sciencefun.org

Materials Needed: 

• A glass plate, bowl or picture frame
• Dry erase marker
• Water

Directions: 

1. Draw a simple picture on the glass; a stick figure is a good one to start with.
2. Slowly pour a little bit of water onto the plate or into the bowl
3. Swirl the water around to make the picture dance and move!

If you want to learn the science behind this activity, check out this link!

Activity by John Bradley, Floating Teacher
Photo Credit & Inspiration: www.sciencefun.org

Materials:

• Toilet paper and paper towel rolls
• Scissors
• Glue
• Masking/duct/electrical tape
• A piece of cardboard (for the base)
• Markers
• Marbles or pom poms

Steps:

1. Decorate toilet paper rolls if desired!
2. Tape them together to make tunnels.
   • Cut the bottoms out of some of them to make slides.
   • Cut some in half lengthwise.
3. Glue or tape some of the slides to the base by cutting a fringe at the bottom of some of the tubes and securing them to the large piece of cardboard
4. Use marbles (or even pom poms) to test out your marble run and make adjustments as needed!

Activity by Stephanie Zafferano, Fiske Site
Photo Credit: www.powerfulmothering.com

Activity Length: 15-30 min 

Materials needed:

• Colored paint for your ice cream and toppings
  • We recommend green, red and brown paint if you want to make a mint chocolate chip cone topped with a cherry!
• Elmer’s Glue
• Shaving cream
• Thick white paper
  • We recommend cardstock or recycling a piece of white cardboard
• Brown cardboard
• Scissors
• Markers
• Paintbrush

Directions:

1. Start by mixing the Elmer’s glue with the shaving cream until you get stiff peaks in the mixture. You can also use the ziploc bag technique we shared a few weeks ago!
2. Add some green (or whatever ice cream color you chose) paint or food coloring to the puffy paint.
3. Cut out a triangle cone from your brown cardboard and draw lines with a marker.
4. Using a paintbrush, paint ice cream scoops on your thick white paper with the puffy paint you created.
5. Take a tiny paintbrush and add details to your ice cream. For example, you could use brown paint to add chocolate chips, or a bunch of rainbow colors to add sprinkles! You can also add a red cherry at the top if you want to.
6. Let it dry overnight and it’ll be puffy to touch and have a 3D appearance!

Activity by John Bradley, Floating Teacher

Inspiration & Photo Credit: www.craftymorning.com

ACTIVITY LENGTH:

30 min

PREP TIME NEEDED: 

10 min

MATERIALS NEEDED: 

• Cupcake liners (you can also fold paper like a paper fan to create a similar effect!)
• Construction paper, any color
• Pipe cleaners
• Glue
• Blue paint

DIRECTIONS:

1. Fold the cupcake liners in half to create the top of the umbrellas.
2. Cut the pipe cleaners in half for the umbrella holders.
3. Glue the two umbrella pieces onto the paper (a few umbrellas all over the page).
4. Use your finger and the blue paint to add tiny raindrops.

Activity by Stephanie Zafferano, Fiske Site