Fizzy Dough | Experimenting with Chemical Reactions

Welcome to 7th edition of 12 Months of Sensory Dough where 12 KBN Bloggers will bring you their special spin on a popular sensory dough. This month’s feature… FIZZY Dough! Our hope is to provide a resource where you can find all things Sensory Dough in one place. We feel so excited about this being a place for you to find and share great ideas, that we have opened our link-ups for an entire year.

Fizzy Dough Experiment

{THIS POST MAY CONTAIN AFFILIATE LINKS TO MATERIALS I RECOMMEND. ANYTHING YOU PURCHASE THROUGH THESE LINKS HELPS SUPPORT LEMON LIME ADVENTURES. THANK YOU IN ADVANCE FOR CHOOSING TO SUPPORT US.}

WHAT IS FIZZY DOUGH?

 Simply put, Fizzy Dough is… any sensory dough that fizzes or bubbles

The ingredients can vary widely from recipe to recipe .

However, every Fizzy Dough has two main components

1. A Moldable Dough Base (usually only 1-2 ingredients)
2. A Liquid Reactor (usually vinegar or similar)

As you will read from my co-hosts, there are variations and differing opinions as to what Fizzy Dough is and how it should react. Let’s find out more about it!

WHAT SHOULD FIZZY DOUGH LOOK LIKE?

What is Fizzy Dough

According to the awesomeness at Learn Play Imagine, Fun at Home with Kids, Growing a Jeweled Rose, you might describe Fizzy Dough as

Moldable

Fizzy

Bubbly

Foamy

If you click through to their recipes you will see that they differ from what is in the base dough to what reactor should be used. So we set out to figure out the best Fizzy Dough Recipe!

WHAT EXPERIMENT DID WE DO WITH FIZZY DOUGH?

Around here, we LOVE all things Fizzy! So when it came time to start creating a project around Fizzy Dough, every one was on board. I knew we had done many fizzing experiments in the past and planned to use that background knowledge to create a child driven experiment with this dough.

The boys remembered immediately about how they have used different ingredients to make something fizz, but the one thing they remembered as a constant was Baking Soda. It wasn’t long before they came up with their question…

What Reactor Creates the Best Chemical Reaction When Mixed with the Base (dough)?

They used their prior knowledge from our 5 Fizzy Experiments and our Christmas Science Projects to pick 3 different liquids they wanted to test. So we set out to make 3 batches of dough, and filled our bottles to prepare for the experiment.

Colored Fizzing Sensory Dough

Every time we do any science experiment we work very hard to limit our variables and find our constants. In this case we decided to make three batches of Fizzy Dough. Each recipe is the same, except we added color to them to make it easier to observe the chemical reaction between the dough and the reactors.

Molding Fizzy Dough

It wouldn’t be fizzy dough, if we didn’t actually get to mold it and shape it. The dough has the consistency of cloud dough. It can be molded but it also is crumbly and changes shape. The recipe we came up with was quite simple and just two ingredients:

1/2 box Baking Soda (1 cup)

4 Tablespoons Water (we mixed in a tad of icing coloring)

I will say that the recipe isn’t always exact, if your dough is too runny… add baking soda. If your dough is too crumbly… add more water. If you click through the recipes from the other bloggers, you will see some other AMAZING recipes. For this experiment, we wanted to keep the dough as simple as possible, just to test the reactors.

Fizzy Dough Experiment Setup

Now we were ready to test! As I mentioned before, the boys decided on the following reactors based on past experiments we have done. I let them choose all of the reactors (they actually wanted to add soda water as one, but changed their mind before we did the experiment) Later, right?

Our Reactors:

Vinegar

Lemon Juice

Vinegar with Several Squirts of Dish Soap

Molding Sensory Fizzing Dough

Before we began, the boys both decided to make a play scene out of their doughs. The red became a volcano, the blue became the ocean, and the yellow the sun. NOW they were finally ready for our 3 tests.

No  good experiment is complete without a good hypothesis or prediction…. The boys both predicted that the volcano (the vinegar) would have the strongest chemical reaction. Are you ready to see what happened?

Testing Vinegar and Fizzy Dough

Vinegar Fizzy Dough Experiment

FUN! But not near as much FIZZ as they were hoping for!

Testing Vinegar + Soap and Fizzy Dough

Vinegar Soap Fizzy Dough Experiment.

WOW! Look at that reaction! Not sure that can be beat! The reaction caused the coolest foam to rise out of the dough and take over. The fizz lasted longer and the reaction was more visible.

Testing Lemon Juice and Fizzy Dough

Lemon Fizzy Dough Experiment

REALLY COOL! The reaction of the lemon juice caused a different kind of FIZZ! Bubbles galore!

Conclusion: The combination of the vinegar and soap created the most vibrant long lasting fizz, however each reactor was equally as exciting to create. This experiment quickly turned into a sensory experiment that lasted over an hour!

Experiment Turned Sensory Play

sensory play with fizzy doughThe fizzing continued. The experiment was over but the discovery was definitely just beginning. The boys squeezed, mixed and tested for the next hour until all the NEW FIZZ was gone (well, until we ran out of liquid for them to squeeze). They loved seeing the colors run together. The different fizz each one made, and what happened when the different foams began to mix.

Sensory Foam.

It was all bets off once they started to put their hands in it! They were both reluctant at first.

Sensory Foaming Fizzing Dough

But who could resist THOSE BUBBLES?

WERE WE SUCCESSFUL AT MAKING FIZZY DOUGH?

I have to start by saying that this dough has turned into an instant favorite in our house! I think I like playing with it more than the boys do. We already have a list of activities we want to try with the doughs and extensions to our science explorations.

So let’s see… Did we create a dough that fizzes?

Fizzing Dough 3 Experiments

I would say, Yes! In fact we made 1 dough that fizzes three different ways!

Fizzy Dough Experiment Chemical Reactions

We actually loved it so much that we made a second batch and let the batch dry just a tad before adding the reactors. LOOK at the results!

Did we make FIZZ?

Foam for Sensory Play

I would say YES! SUCCESS!

NOW FOR THE FUN PART…

Would you call this recipe a success or a fail? Do you have a favorite FIZZY Dough recipe or activity that you consider a success or do you have a fail you want to share? We want to see! Link up your posts or post pictures to FacebookInstagramTwitter orGoogle+. Tag your pictures with#ilovesensorydough.

Be sure to check out each blogger, as we will each provide a different take on the dough, some of us with have the BEST recipe ever, while others (probably me) will show you our attempts (both failed and successful)

You can read more about each Co-hosts and more about the Series  or follow along below:

LEMON LIME ADVENTURE~LOOK! WE’RE LEARNING!~GLITTERING MUFFINS~STILL PLAYING SCHOOL~
LITTLE BINS FOR LITTLE HANDS!~NATURAL BEACH LIVING~THE EYES OF A BOY~POWERFUL MOTHERING~
WILDFLOWER RAMBLINGS!~I HEART CRAFTY THINGS~DELIGHTFUL LEARNING ~THE LIFE OF JENNIFER DAWN

PLEASE READ THE FOLLOWING GUIDELINES BEFORE LINKING UP.

  • Share family-friendly posts related to the month’s theme. Feel free to link old or new posts that highlight your favorite recipes for sensory dough. Failures and unsuccessful attempts are welcome.
  • We ask that no posts are linked with copy/paste recipes from other sources. If you use a recipe from another source, please link back to the original recipe.
  • By linking up, you give permission to share your post and one photograph in future posts and through social media channels.
  • Visit 2-3 other posts that others have shared. Discover new ideas and meet new friends!

The linky will remain open all year. On the 12th of each month, all co-hosts will post a new dough with their spin, highlighting at least one post from the month before and pin each post to the 12 Months of Sensory Dough Board.

Follow Dayna :: Lemon Lime Adventures’s board Best of the Best Sensory Dough on Pinterest.

HAVE YOU MISSED ALL THE OTHER DOUGHS?

MORE BACK BUTTON.jpg       12 months of Sensory     MORE BUTTON

Be sure to click through and check out the whole series! The link-ups are open ALL YEAR LONG! 

GET READY FOR NEXT MONTH:  SLIME DOUGH

Slime Dough  

FREE DOWNLOAD

Discover how to get siblings to get along even when all they do is annoy each other with the Sibling “Get Along” Poster Pack!

9 thoughts on “Fizzy Dough | Experimenting with Chemical Reactions”

  1. Wow! You came up with so many great ways to make fizzy dough! I was totally blanking and went with the old standby…lol. We’ll be doing these for sure!

    1. Lemon Lime Adventures

      Awesome! We had SOO MUCH fun! Loved your post too!

  2. Wow! Can’t wait to try this! I bet my Mr Frog will love it 🙂

    1. Lemon Lime Adventures

      Awesome! So glad to hear! I’d love to see pics! Be sure to come share!

  3. As always, I love how you define the dough and then take off to create, experiment and enjoy! Love all the fizz photos!

    1. Lemon Lime Adventures

      Thank you! We had so much fun! We Really Really LOVE this series!

    1. Lemon Lime Adventures

      Thank you for your kind words!

  4. Pingback: How to Homeschool With Play Dough, Salt Dough, and Clay

Leave a Comment

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

CONNECT WITH ME

Scroll to Top