The ping pong ball experiment

Ping Pong ball experiment
Ping Pong ball experiment

Here’s a great science experiment to try with your preschool that teaches a bit about air pressure and  demonstrate how air moves from areas of higher pressure to areas of lower pressure. Before you try out this experiment, talk with your preschooler about what might happen. Let your child think about the possibilities and predict what the outcome will be. They’ll be amazed at the results!

You need:

  • an electric blow dryer (hair dryer)
  • ping pong balls (no wiffle balls please)

If you don’t have a ping pong ball, try a few different sizes of plastic Easter eggs or other similar plastic balls.How to do it:

  1. Turn the dryer on, holding it so that the air flows toward the ceiling
  2. Carefully place the ball in the center of the air stream close to the blow dryer

Once the ball is floating, try moving around holding the dryer to watch the ball travel with youCaution: some dryers get very hot, so becareful where your child holds on

This idea came from Homeschool Creations

ping pong ball experiment When we tried this experiment, we didn’t have any ping pong balls. So instead we dug up every small plastic ball like object we could find and were amazed at the different effects. We tried a plastic golf ball, a plastic baseball used as an Easter egg like object, and 3 different sizes of Easter eggs. The medium egg even had holes in it… but it still floated a bit!