Watermelon Volcano Experiment – Summer Activity for Preschoolers

Looking for fun things to do with watermelon for your upcoming watermelon theme or National Watermelon Day on August 3rd? Kids will go nuts over this watermelon volcano project! This watermelon experiment allows kids to witness the chemical reaction when baking soda and vinegar mix . This summer activity for kids is such a fun and easy volcano experiment perfect for toddler, preschool, pre-k, kindergarten, first grade, and 2nd graders to try.

Watermelon Volcano

Every kids needs to try the a volcano experiment at some point. While young kids may not understand about volcanoes or be ready to make a complex project, they will appreciate the WOW effect in this chemistry experiment. This volcano science experiment combines a watermelon activity with fun summer activities for preschoolers, toddlers, kindergartners, grade 1, grade 2, and gade 3 students. This watermelon volcano is so simple it will only take you a couple minutes to pre and a couple minutes to watch the watermelon explosion!  Whether you are a parent, teacher, or homeschooeler – you will want to add this to your watermelon day activities or summer camp ideas!

Easy Volcano Experiment

All you need to try this simple watermelon project are a few simle materials that you already have on hand. This kitchen science project is perfect for busy families as you can do this summer science activity in just a couple minutes with common things you already have on hand!

• watermelon – any size you like
• knife (for adult to use and supervise)
• spoon or scoop
• 1 cup baking soda
• 1/4 cup dish soap
• red food coloring
• vinegar

Watermelon Activities

Start by preparing your watermelon to become a volcano. You can use any size of watermelon you like, just adjust the baking soda and vinegar accordingly for a big erruption! Cut a hole in top of watermelon that is just big enough to scoop, but the smaller the hole, the better for your volcano erruption as the lava will all be forced up the hole. Scoop out the inside like you carve a pumpkin. The reason we scoop it out isn’t for the science experiment with a watermelon, it is to avoid being wasteful with food! All we need for this watermelon activity is the watermelon container or shell, so-to-speak.

Watermelon Science

When you are ready for your erruption take your watermelon fruit outside or put on a tray with the surrounding surfaces covered – just in case! Now add  baking soda, dish soap, and red food coloring (the more the better for a deep red color).

NOTE: You don’t need the dish soap to make the summer science experiment work, but it will make it bubble!

Watermelon Experiment

Pour in vinegar, about 1-2 cups, until you get some fun fizz starting to come up.

Watermelon Activities for Preschoolers

The volcano will begin to fizz and flow the “lava” from the inside down the side of the watermelon!

Watermelon Theme

Your kids will love this fun and silly summer experiment!

Easy Summer Activity

Make sure you do this easy summer experiment on a baking dish with a lip or outside to contain all the red lava that comes out.

Baking Soda and Vinegar Reaction

This easy summer science is super CHEAP! Just use a watermelon you were going to eat anyway, and add some inexpensive baking soda and vinegar, some food coloring for color, and wala!

Vinegar and Baking Soda Reaction

If your kids can’t get enough of this science experiment, it’s normal. Ours begged to do it again and I was happy to oblige! Just dump in more baking soda and vinegar, plus food coloring and dish soap if you wish. No need to rinse or clean the tray unless you are out of room on the tray. That’s part of why we like to do our project outside. As you can see ours was more pink the second time because I used most of our food coloring the first time around. But guess what, the kids didn’t care – they though it was still super cool and giggled with excitement.

Summer Activity for Preschoolers

So what is happening in this cool fizzy chemistry experiment? Basically you are creating an acid and a base experiment. The vinegar is an acid and the baking soda is a base. When they mix they produce carbon dioxide. This fizzing gas will take up more and more space forcing the liquid in your watermelon to be forced up and out to create room for all the newly created CO2.

 

 

Food Activities

• Food Match the Same Letter Worksheets
• Food Color by Number Worksheets or Sweet Treat Color by Alphabet Worksheets
• 🍓 Strawberfrry Playdough Fruit Activity, handprint Strawberry Craft, or printable Rhyming Strawberry Activity
• 💙 Hands-on Blueberry Math
• Dancing Raisins – EASY chemistry experiment for kids
• 🥥 Coconut Number Tracing Fruit Printables or 🍅 Simple Tomato Battery Fruit Science Experiment
• Math Fruit Worksheet Preschool and A-Z Vegetable and Fruit Printables for practicing lowercase letters
• 🍌Banana Number Puzzles or Free Printable ABC Fruits and Vegetables Book for Kids to color and learn
• I Spy Fruits Worksheet for Preschool
• 🍉 Epic watermelon volcano, play with puffy watermelon slime reicpe, or see all our watermelon activities
• 🍋 Lemon Volcano is a super EASY and fun Fruit Science, fun lemon playdough,  or lemonade TEn Frames Kindergarten
• 🍎 Sorting Apples Alphabet Activity or this Apple Counting Math for Fall
• 🍏 Apple Life Cycle Worksheets, fluffy apple slime, or make this simple Paper Plate Apple Core Craft
• Count to 20 Clip Card Fruit Printables or Fruit Loop Alphabet Worksheets for Preschool
• 🍇 How to make Grape Jam Sequencing Cards or PB&J Coloring Pages
• Proteins Number 14 worksheet pages, Breads Number 13 Worksheets for preschool, fruit Number 8 worksheets

Ice Cream Activities for Preschoolers

• AMAZING, Edible Play Doh Ice Cream Recipe that scoops like ice creaam!
• Free Ice Cream I Spy Worksheet or color matching Ice Cream Activity
• ALPHABET – tracing letters Ice Cream Alphabet, Ice Cream Alphabet Puzzles to match upper and lowercase letters, Ice Cream Alpabet Playdough Mats, Summer activities for preschoolers making Popsicle Alphabet Puzzles, Alphabet Popsicles in this Summer Activity for Preschoolers
• MATH – Ice Cream Make 10 Game, pattern Ice Cream Pattern Printable, printable Ice Cream Math craft, scoop up Ice Cream Counting Printable, popsicle count to 10 clip cards Summer Activities for Preschoolers, counting  Summer Activity for Preschool puzzles, count to 20 Ice Cream Math Sundae, Number Bonds Practice, scoop a sundae Place Value Activity or Place Value Activity, Ice Cream Math Game, and Shape Playdough Mats, Addition with this Ice Cream Math task cards, fun Ice Cream Math Worksheets, Ice Cream Division Puzzles
• LANGUAGE ARTS – ce Cream Compound Word Activity, scooping Digraph Activity, free Ice Cream Sentence Scrambles, or this suffixes activity
• CRAFT – TONS of cute Ice Cream Craft Preschool, Simple Ice Cream Coloring Pages, I is for Ice Cream handart project, Ice Cream craft using washi tape, Printable Ice Cream Math Craft
• ICE CREAM RECIPES– Fun and EASY How to Make your own Ice Cream in a Bag, EASY homemade vanilla ice cream, delicious peaches and cream ice cream recipe
• Ice Cream Themed, Summer Bucket List Ideas