playing with fire

[meemee]

dd is almost 9. and tonight she got interested in fire. playing with fire. i dont want to squash this but encourage her curiousity in a safe way. 

after the fireworks she spent a lot of time with just matches and a candle. she knows the whole stop, drop and roll. she got herself a bowl of water before she started playing and moved flammable things far away from the candle. 

she tied up her hair and wore cotton clothes. 

so i think she gets the safety aspect and what is flammable and what is not. 

this is pure curiosity. how hair burns. and smells. how matches burn. how they burn if they are wet. how they burn when they are wet but have wax on them....

any idea on how to play with fire without fireworks?

dd is a pretty responsible child and definitely gets safety issues. 

[LynnS6]

No ideas except to tell her that if she wants to play with fire, she must come get you/tell you so that you know and can help monitor her.

Can you go camping & have her help build the campfire? Get a chimney starter and have her help start the fire on the grill?

[intentionalmama]

A few weeks ago my son's friend brought out a magnifying glass and showed my son and some other kids  how to burn leaves. They didn't create fire, but they got lots of smoke. The kids were fascinated.   His friend's mother, other mothers, and I were there. My friend (friend's mother) was totally ok with it. She says they have often set things on fire in their back yard. She is very responsible and so I completely trust her; I just know I am very nervous around the idea of creating fire with children.  Then a few days ago my husband and son (8) found a broken bird's nest on the ground. They took it into the yard and had fun looking at how and what it was made of. My son then wanted to try the magnifying glass on it.  So they ended up burning it with the glass. They both thought it was pretty amazing. I was amazed to hear how it had worked.   Again, must be done safely etc and with supervision.

[meemee]

ugh i have to now come up with a curriculum on fire. 

dd was helping with grilling in the backyard and she was noticing teh difference of cooking meat on the flame rather than in the pan and oven. 

cremation also came up somewhere today. 

and exactly what makes fireworks work the way they do. 

lynn no she wont start a fire on her own ever. 

intentionalmama dd has already played with the microscope and fire and has done some fire etchings on wood with a magnifying glass a couple of years ago. she learnt a lot when we used our solar cooker and she prodded a friend about the science of it. 

[Smokering]

Is magnesium the one that burns green? You should do a chemistry component to the curriculum - show her how to make blue flames and white flames and so on with various substances. That'd be neat. :)

Do you live out in the country, or have friends with a farm or something, so she could help build and light a bonfire? With shmallows? :)

Or, ooh, have her help you make creme brulee, if you can get hold of a blowtorch. That's incredibly fun. You can also use brulee blowtorches to sizzle the skin off tomatoes, although I'm not sure why you'd want to...

[Mummoth]

You could get her a rotary candle holder... though it might be difficult to find one this time of year. She could try and figure out how heat creates motion.

[karne]

I would not let my child of that age play with fire just for fun.

Edited by karne - 7/6/11 at 5:24pm

[mamalisa]

Originally Posted by karne 

I would not let my child of that age play with fire just for fun.

Did you read the OP's second post on everything they've talked about since she became interested in fire?  This is a prime teaching opportunity and I don't believe there is any play that is "just for fun".  Children are always learning, even when it's just "fun".  Fire is a huge part of life, it's good to know a lot about it.

Sounds like a field trip to the fire dept is in order as well!

[meemee]

oooh good call mamalisa. i hadnt thought about that. 

ok mamas - please help me come up with a curriculum on fire. the heat has zapped my brains. 

so far i have got what you have posted here. i can cover the biology aspect of fire (that is: the effect of fire) which i think dd is aware of already because of our volunteering we do. 

just last evening we were talking to some rangers how a fire leapt across the river a few years ago due to super high winds. got dd curious for sure and ask questions. 

do schools do a higher elementary grade visit to the firestation? they did it in K (mainly for kids to know what to do and to know what a dressed up fireman looks like) but i think it would be good in the higher grades too.

with chemicals there are two ways to go about it. one burn stuff to see what colour they burn, and another is what happens if they are exposed to the air how they burn. 

so 'fire' we are discovering has many different definitions. oh this is getting far too complicated than i had imagined. including 'holy fire' aspect too. 

[mammal_mama]

My own dd -- my older one -- got interested in this a few years ago. I supervised her and let her have at it...Dh created a nice little fire pit in the back yard, and we've roasted some marshmallows and hot dogs out there. It's a nice spot for dd to go when that fiery urge comes upon her! I'm so glad dh made the pit because at first we were doing it in the driveway in plain view of anyone who might be passing by...and you know how concerned some folks can get?

Nowadays she's a lot more interested in cooking on the stove than she is in the fire-thing.

[meemee]

last night we were burning all sorts of things over a candle in our backyard. hair, plastic (she was shocked how easily and quickly that caught on fire), rubber - which of course went on to many other things. 

[ollyoxenfree]

If it isn't just the flames that she likes and she's ready to investigate the chemical and physical concepts behind fire, you can look up home experiments on oxidation and exothermic reactions. There are simple experiments using steel wool, vinegar and water.

[4evermom]

My ds has been fascinated by fire since he was 1.  I swear he'd find a pack of matches or a lighter every time we went on a walk, too.  And he could use them at the age of 3.  To keep him from experimenting with it in closets (), I told him he could play with fire anytime he wanted, that he just had to tell me.  Using fire is an important skill.  I've been amazed at the number of kids, his age and older who reach over the candles on a cake and almost burn themselves.  I frequently am on the receiving end of snarky implications that I'm remiss in educating him, then I hear of people who refuse to let their children learn these important, possibly life saving, skills.  He knows to clear away flammable material like leaves and twigs before starting a fire outside.  He knows to have water handy.  I still supervise, of course, even though he's been "playing" with fire for years.  But on the off chance he is with other kids and one starts a fire, he won't be clueless.

You've gotten many good ideas.  Another fun microscope idea is setting off the caps for cap guns (the paper roll style).  Unroll it and aim the light at the little bump.  You get a little bang but don't have to be quite as patient as you do to actually light a fire.  It's good to realize a house fire can start by leaving eyeglasses or a drinking glass on a sunny windowsill the same way as with a microscope.

Ds went through a phase where he'd wonder how every sort of material would burn so he'd try it out and make observations.  I discouraged him from burning in quantity things that would make fumes but he'd try little pieces.  He likes experimenting with colored fire.  He loves fireworks and sometimes dismantles them to see how they are made.

Originally Posted by ollyoxenfree 

If it isn't just the flames that she likes and she's ready to investigate the chemical and physical concepts behind fire, you can look up home experiments on oxidation and exothermic reactions. There are simple experiments using steel wool, vinegar and water.

Oooh, steel wool.   You can burn it with a 9V battery, too.  Good to know, don't pack your batteries next to your steel wool!  And don't put batteries in your pocket (where they can complete the circuit with loose change or keys) and burn you.  Things I probably should have learned when I was a kid...