Dec
10
Pine Cone Lessons
-by Mimi Rothschild
When you go to cut your Christmas tree, send the kids around to gather up a good sack of pine cones as well. Use them for some fun, hands-on lessons.
Make a pine cone bird feeder. This is a satisfyingly messy project. Before you begin, do some research with your students to determine what kind of foods your local birds will most enjoy.
• Tie strings around the stem ends of your pine cones. Put peanut butter into a pie tin or plate, and use hands or safe knives to spread it all over the pine cones. Hang the cones in a safe place.
• Into another dish, pour bird seed, oatmeal, corn meal, dried fruits, and any other foods your research suggests your feathered friends would enjoy. For a very special artistic element to the project, put these items into different dishes and line them up on a table where your young artists can reach them.
• Now take the peanut butter-covered pine cones and roll them in the birdseed and other bird foods. With care, you can create patterns of different colors and textures.
• Hang the pine cone bird feeders on the trees outside, preferably where you can see them from an inside window. Take pictures of the birds that come to visit and learn their names, or count and graph them for a math lesson.
Make fire fancies. Have a chemistry lesson in and make a great holiday gift at the same time. The basic idea is to soak pine cones in water into which you have mixed some salt. Point out that mixing salt into water creates a solution. Put the pine cones in first thing in the morning and take them out at the end of the day. Set them to dry overnight, and you’re finished. A basket of these makes a sweet Christmas present. The fun comes when you put these pine cones into a fire — each type of salt will produce different colored flames. Here are some salts to try out:
• sodium chloride (table salt)
• sodium borate (borax)
• magnesium sulphate (Epsom salts)
• potassium chloride (salt substitute)
Make pine cone firestarters.
• Put a block of paraffin (from the grocery or craft store) into a clean coffee can. Put the coffee can into a big pot of water.
• Stir in old broken crayons for color.
• Dip the pine cones into the wax. Tie a string around each cone to hold it while dipping. You will find that you need to dip each cone several times to get a good thick coat of wax.
• You can also mix the salts listed above with sawdust and dredge the newly-waxed pine cones in the mixture, for firestarters that also make colors.
• Hang the firestarters overnight to dry.
As you dip the pine cones, you can discuss forms of matter, since you melting a solid into a liquid and allowing it to solidify again, and then burning it to create a gas. This is also a good time to talk about fire safety.