January 29, 2015

Fun soap making with Home Schoolers

Earlier in the week we were asked to share soap making with a class of about 30 kids who range in age from 1st graders to high school seniors… great kids that are learning in a home school setting rather than the traditional options. They meet weekly for art and science as a large group…. in a well organized, structured situation.

OUR MISSION: Teach the science of making soap, and then have the kids participate in the process of making the soap. We assigned tasks:

Lining the soap mold
Taping the lining down
Measuring the oils (each oil was a different child)
Measuring the essential oils
Grinding the botanicals (Lavender Buds)
Mixing the oils together
Heating the oils
Testing temperature of the lye water
Testing temperature of the oil mix
Using the blender stick to mix the oils with lye mixture
adding the essential oils/botanicals
pouring the mix into the mold
washing dishes
drying dishes
covering the soap batch

All told we made two 4 pound batches of soap. The first was lavender, the second was rosemary peppermint.

We had a great day, and than you Mrs Tina for having us out. You have such a wonderful group of kids who are eager to learn, enjoy the learning process, and get along so well together. Here are some photos:

We explained the saponification process – however i never got to give my presentation… lighting, time and the lack of visibility to see it caused us to make a decision to just teach the content, rather than run the prezi. Here it is if you would like to see what we planned to show.