Santa’s Frozen Hands Activity

What do you get when you fill a plastic glove with water and freeze? Simple but super cool science for kids of all ages! Santa’s frozen hands will amaze your kids and keep them busy for maybe even a whole hour this holiday season. One of our easiest Christmas Science Experiments ever!

Christmas Theme Ice Melt Activities

Melting Santa’s frozen hands! What a simple but effective science activity for beginner scientists! I adore this simple ice melt activity, and we love ice melt activities in general. We use them all year round and have a terrific collection of ice activities for preschoolers already!

Here are a few of our favorites…

• Halloween Frozen Hands
• Icy Ocean Sensory Bin
• Evergreen Ice Melt For Winter
• Rescue the LEGO Ice Melt
• Frozen Castles
• Valentine Frozen Hands

Frozen hands are super easy to make! I know my son really loves holiday themed activities, so I love to create cool and festive Christmas activities for us to try out together.

This will keep the kids busy in the morning. When it’s all melted, it turns into a lovely water sensory bin, too. The water will be icy cold, so add some warm water for a comfortable play temperature!

It’s like going on a treasure hunt for Christmas goodies! Excellent fine motor skills play with the eye droppers and basters. Little hands get a great workout while having so much fun finding everything! Plus, it’s science too!

Introduce simple science concepts to this ice melt activity by talking about how the water changes from a liquid to a solid when it is frozen, and then back again to a liquid.

Make sure to ask questions to get them thinking! What differences do you notice? What happens to the frozen water when it is not as cold?

Here’s another easy solid, liquid, gas experiment you can do with young kids!

All Kids Can Be Scientists!

So what exactly is a scientist and how can you encourage your kids to be scientists without a whole lot of effort, fancy equipment, or difficult 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!

A good scientist asks questions 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 really spark their inner curiosity.

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 yourself 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

The Science of Melting Ice

At what temperature does ice melt? Water not only freezes at 0 degrees Celsius or 32 degrees Fahrenheit, but it also melts at the same temperature! This is why we call this temperature the FREEZING and MELTING point of water!

Freezing and melting are examples of phase changes. They are physical changes of water, not chemical changes.

Freezing occurs at this temperature as heat is removed from the water to form ice crystals. In order to melt ice, you have to use heat energy. The heat energy first goes to break down the ice before it raises the temperature of the water.

Ice at the freezing point of water actually has less energy or heat in it than water at the same temperature!

Check out more ways to experiment with water, as well as tons of ice play activities!

Get your FREE printable Christmas STEM activities guide!

—> START HERE: Grab the FREE STEM Christmas Countdown Challenges and Project List!

Melting Santa’s Frozen Hands

Supplies:

• disposable gloves
• glitter!
• sequins, mini ornaments, buttons, and beads {whatever you have!}
• water
• tray for holding hands while they freeze
• container for melting hands in and collecting water
• an eyedropper and or turkey baster

Ice Melt Activity Set Up:

STEP 1: Add fun items, glitter and food coloring (optional) to a disposable glove.

STEP 2: Fill the glove all the way with water and cinch the end with a rubber band as if you were tying off a balloon.

STEP 3: Place in the freezer on a tray!

Make up your Santa hands and get them freezing right away! We were generous with the glitter and covered in it! Mine took a good day to freeze solid. My son was amazed by the hands and had to keep checking the freezer!

STEP 4. Remove the frozen hands by cutting the end off of the rubber glove and peeling the glove off of the hand. Set them in a container filled with Epsom salt for pretend snow {totally optional}! It makes it look so pretty and wintery!

STEP 5. All you need to add to your frozen hands ice melt activity is warm water, basters, or eye droppers!

It’s that simple, and we loved melting the frozen hands to uncover the treasures inside. You will too!

The frozen hands shimmer as they melt! Yes, we truly have glitter everywhere, but it is worth it! Surprise your kids with Santa’s frozen hands. They will get a real kick out of it!

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.