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Science is in the Cards

Basher Science Card Game

Our family loves to play games, it’s one of the ways we bond. So you can imagine how my interest was piqued when I saw a shelf full of cards and toy figurines featuring characters based on DNA, pyrite, atoms, and other sciency topics. We were at Target looking for gifts, but when I saw the Basher Science toy and card game set, I couldn’t help but buy a box “for research purposes”.

We chose the Chemistry Card Game and the Atom single pack. We previously had the book about Physics from the same company, but it had been a dud with our girls. The Basher Science core theme is to anthropomorphize science concepts, but they made the poor choice to make all the physics concepts boys, and that sort of thing always turns us off. Hopefully they do better in other books, but speaking as a former physics professor,  we really need to stop doing things that turn girls away from physics.

Anyhoo, back to the game. There are two separate toys in each box: the card game, and the figurine. The figurines are the aforementioned anthropomorphized science concepts, and they match characters in the books and on the cards. They look great, are very cute, the kids love them and play with them all the time (i.e. they cause fights because both kids want them), and they are well made. However they play no role in the card game.

The card game works really well as a game. You each select 8 cards out of the pool of cards that come in the box, then draw 3. Each round you select a card to play and see who scores points. The rules are simple, as is the strategy, but the game introduces several concepts that are used extensively in more complex games. Deckbuilding (picking 8 cards out of a larger pool) is a core concept in games like Pokemon, Magic the Gathering, and many more. Also, each card has a special ability that forces you to make interesting choices. Learning how to use special abilities to defeat your opponent is another key gaming concept. The game is fun, and we’ve played many times.

The game is only for two players, and you have to be able to read. Beginner readers will have a tough time parsing some of the words and understanding the special abilities, so our 6 year old daughter didn’t play. Fortunately the figures weren’t needed for the game, so she had a blast playing with those while I played the card game with her 9 year old sister.

There are three core sets that come with one figure and a bunch of cards each: Chemistry, Biology, and Rocks & Minerals. There are also a handful of add-ons that each come with a figure and a few cards. Of course, there’s also a checklist so you can track your figurine collection and see what you still need to get. Adding new cards to the game increases you pool, but you still only pick 8. The increased variety is worth having though, so I plan to get more cards and figures.

The only real disappointment is that the gameplay has nothing to do with the science. Each card has a science character and a factoid, but your kid could ignore those. When I played with my daughter, we read the factoids and talked about the science as we played, so it made for a good conversation starter, and she definitely got interested in the science. She even recalled the old physics book from the same publisher and asked to read it. Ever since, we’ve been reading that every night. So I call that a win, and I recommend this game.

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Whoa, Whoa, Whoa…Volcano!

vinegar, baking soda, and a bottle.
Hard to mess with the classics, but here are some extra tips to try.

A popular experiment with kids is to put baking soda in a bottle and then add vinegar. The mixture foams up and bubbles out of the container like lava coming out of a volcano. We’re no stranger to the volcano experiment, so here are some deeper details you can share with your kids as well as a few twists to try.

NOTE you’ll need to take the proper precautions so that no one gets the mixture in their eyes, mouths, etc.

Vinegar is a liquid that contains acetic acid and water. Depending on the variety, you can find other things in there to give it flavor, like apple cider or balsamic vinegar. The amount of acetic acid varies, but is generally pretty low, so vinegar is fairly weak as acids go. That’s why you can safely use it in cooking. It’s on par with lemon juice (remember that for later).

Vinegar is formed when alcohol is fed to a particular variety of bacteria that converts the alcohol to acetic acid. That’s biochemistry! In fact, it’s the same basic process that’s used in brewing, yogurt making, baking with yeast, and many biotech companies. They all fall under the name “fermentation”. In each case, you have single celled organisms that take a particular food source (alcohol) and convert it to something you want (acetic acid). We’ve done several fermentation projects with our kids, so keep an eye out for those articles coming soon.

The volcano happens when the acetic acid in the vinegar reacts with the baking soda, a.k.a. sodium bicarbonate, a mild alkali salt (it is a mild base, which is the opposite of an acid). This reaction is an easy to demonstrate example of chemistry. When the two chemicals mix, their atoms recombine, creating carbon dioxide, among other things. Carbon dioxide appears as a gas, i.e. the bubbles. They are trapped in the mixture by surface tension, and as more and more carbon dioxide is produced, the bubbles grow and the mixture gets bigger, eventually overflowing the container. ERUPTION! The bubbles in soft drinks are also carbon dioxide gas, but they come from something else. They do behave similarly if you shake up your bottle.

OK, that’s the background. Now the experiments. First, demonstrate the process by spooning some baking soda into a bottle or other container and then adding vinegar. We like to do it over a cookie sheet to contain the mess. Ask your kids to think about what they can change, and then try it out. If they get stuck, here are some suggestions. Be sure to have the kids predict what will happen before you try it. Then afterwards, they can come up with explanations about what they saw.

  • Different shaped containers: bottles (wide at the bottom, narrow at the top), bowls (the opposite), wide or narrow glasses, etc.
  • Different acids: Remember the lemon juice comment? Try lemon juice. Try coffee. Try whatever you have, but don’t waste the good balsamic. Save that for salads. Try buttermilk or kefir.
  • Different base: Baking powder looks and sounds kind of like baking soda. Does it work? What about baking soda toothpaste or kitty litter? What about a fresh box of baking soda vs. an open box that has been sitting in the fridge for months?
  • Different amounts of baking soda and/or vinegar.
soda bread on cooling rack
Mmmmm, homemade soda bread

When you’re done playing around and have washed up, serve up a snack of soda bread. Soda bread is made with baking soda and buttermilk, which is acidic. When the bread is baking, the volcano reaction is going on inside, producing carbon dioxide bubbles inside. That’s what makes the bread fluffy rather than a solid brick. Stay tuned for a soda bread project post.