Did you know you can grow crystals with a common kitchen ingredient? Yes, salt! Grow salt crystals at home or in the classroom and give it a gingerbread man theme for Christmas science too! Our growing salt crystals gingerbread man project is perfect for young scientists!
Grow Salt Crystals For Gingerbread Science
We usually grow crystals using a borax solution, but it can be even simpler than that! I bet you have exactly what you need for our growing salt crystals gingerbread man science project!
From crystals to slime to ice melting to candy canes, we have simple to do science activities for Christmas. Including lots of fun gingerbread STEM activities for you to try!
Check out this gingerbread man activity with borax crystals!
All Kids Can Be Scientists!
So what exactly is a scientist? How can you encourage your kids to be scientists without a lot of effort, fancy equipment, or complex activities that create confusion rather than curiosity?
A scientist is a person who seeks to acquire knowledge about the natural world. Guess what? Kids do that naturally because they are learning and exploring the world around them. All that exploring brings up a lot of questions!
Make a free printable scientist lapbook!
A good scientist asks questions and makes observations as they explore the natural world, and we can further encourage this with simple science experiments. Knowledge is gained through all of these questions, explorations, and discoveries! Let’s help them by providing fun science activities that spark their inner curiosity.
This Christmas experiment is quick and gives kids that instant gratification they so crave! Being curious, trying different theories, investigating, and exploring are all critical in science. Not every science experiment needs to be deep and probing!
Growing a salt crystal gingerbread man is a perfect kitchen science activity for Christmas! Our salt crystal gingerbread men are entertaining to explore and observe, and the setup is simple enough for busy families and classrooms to fit into the day!
Printable Gingerbread Man Project Pack
For a complete pack of instructions, templates, and extras, grab our Gingerbread Project Pack!
Helpful Science Resources To Get You Started
Here are a few resources that will help you introduce science more effectively to your kiddos or students and feel confident when presenting materials. You’ll find helpful free printables throughout.
- Best Science Practices (as it relates to the scientific method)
- Science Vocabulary
- 8 Science Books for Kids
- All About Scientists
- Science Supplies List
- Science Tools for Kids
- Join us in the Club
How Do Salt Crystals Form
To make salt crystals, you start with a supersaturated solution of salt and water. A supersaturated solution is a mixture that can’t hold any more particles. Like with the salt here, we have filled all the space in the water with salt, and the rest is left behind.
Water molecules are close together in cold water, but when you heat the water up, the molecules spread away from each other. This is what allows you to dissolve more salt in the water than you normally could. It even appears cloudy.
You can try this experiment with cold water to compare the differences in the amount of salt needed to get this mixture, and you can compare the results of the crystals afterward.
So, how do the salt crystals grow? As the solution cools, the water molecules start to come back together, and the salt particles in the solution fall out of place and onto the paper. More will connect with the molecules that have already fallen out of the solution.
As the salt solution cools and the water evaporates, water molecules no longer separate the atoms (niacin and chlorine). They begin to bond together and then bond further forming the special cube-shaped crystal for salt.
Get your FREE printable Christmas STEM activities guide!
Salt Crystal Gingerbread Man
In keeping with our gingerbread man science theme, I thought making salt crystal gingerbread men would be a fun and simple activity to do. It’s super easy to set up but you do need to give it a couple of days to see great results.
Explore all our Gingerbread STEAM projects here.
Supplies:
- Table Salt
- Very Hot Water
- Bowl/Spoon
- Construction Paper Cut-Outs
- Plate/Pan
Instructions:
STEP 1. You will need to cut out some gingerbread man shapes. We used our cookie cutters to trace out these gingerbread men.
Note: You can use any Christmas shapes (or any time of the year) you want!
STEP 2. First, you must start with hot water, which is an adult-only step if required.
We microwaved about 2 cups of water for 2 minutes.
STEP 3. Now, it’s time to add the salt. We added one tablespoon at a time, stirring very well until completely dissolved. You can feel the point at which it’s not gritty as you stir – Close to 6 tablespoons for us!
Do this with each tablespoon until you can’t get rid of that gritty feeling. You will see a bit of salt on the bottom of the container. This is your super-saturated solution!
STEP 4. Place your gingerbread man cutouts in a pan or dish. Pour the solution slowly over the gingerbread men until just covered.
Or you can do like my son and dump the whole solution onto them, including a bit of clumpy salt that hadn’t been mixed in! This is because the solution was so saturated with salt that it couldn’t hold anymore, which is also a great point to discuss.
STEP 5. Place the dish or pan where they might get some sunlight and not be disturbed. Now you have to wait for the water to evaporate. Have fun checking on them every so often and note any changes.
Our Results
Over time, you will see the edges of the solution evaporate quicker, leaving the beginnings of salt crystals around the edges. Because of the amount of salt that was added, it did not completely dissolve in the water. As the water evaporates, it leaves behind the salt.
My son immediately noticed the cube-shaped crystals left behind once the water evaporated. We transferred to a paper towel to let dry, which looked even more neat. Why are they cube-shaped? Answer: when positive and negative ions bond tightly, they form a cube shape.
Extend the Activity
Make sure to use a magnifying glass for observing science! You will notice where we had that clumpy salt mixture drop onto the cutout. Next time, we are going to make a real experiment out of it and test out our sea salt and Epsom salt, too!
Check out a closeup of the cube-shaped salt crystals!
More Awesome Christmas Science Experiments
- Fizzing Christmas Trees
- Santa’s Magic Milk
- Dissolving Candy Canes
- Peppermint Oobleck
- Dissolving Gingerbread Cookies
- Christmas Skittles
More Fun Christmas Activities For Kids
Printable Christmas STEM Project Pack
200+ PAGES OF HOLIDAY THEME STEAM, STEM, Science, and Art!
- 25+ Christmas theme science and STEM activities with printable sheets, instructions, and useful information all using easy-to-source materials perfect for limited-time needs. Includes a holiday theme engineering pack with fun, problem-based challenges for kids to solve! NEW observation sheets included.
- Try a Santa’s Letter airplane challenge or take the gingerbread house-building challenge!
- Explore the five senses with a specially designed Santa’s Lab pack.
- Try a mini nature study with your favorite type of Christmas tree.
- Try your hand at building shapes with gumdrop structure challenge cards or build shapes with jingle bells. Or try the Christmas-themed paper chain challenge!
- Christmas Screen-free Coding activities include algorithm games, binary code ornaments, and more!
- Explore 6+ Christmas Art Projects with famous artist-inspired activities that combine art history, process art techniques, and more with simple to-do ideas.
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