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🧪 Science with Sarah: Invisible ink 🕵️

Let your kids use the power of science to hone their spy skills

👉 Watch the video of Sarah’s school science experiment here!

Hello parents, teachers and students! Here’s a fun experiment that Sherlock Holmes would be proud of, exploring the science of chemical reactions!

Be sure to check out GMSA@9 on Wednesdays when Meteorologist Sarah Spivey does the demonstrations and explains the science behind it.

Science with Sarah: Invite KSAT to your school for live science experiments. (KSAT)

HERE’S WHAT YOU’LL NEED

Materials for invisible ink experiment (Copyright KSAT 2023 - All rights reserved)
  • Water
  • Baking soda
  • Grape juice concentrate (like the stuff in the freezer isle!)
  • Index card
  • Q-tip
  • Paint brush

DO THE EXPERIMENT

  • In a cup, mix some water and baking soda. There should be enough baking soda in the water solution so that it looks cloudy
  • Using a Q-tip dipped into the baking soda and water solution, draw or write something onto the index card. Allow it to dry
  • Paint the grape juice concentrate onto the index card and watch as your drawing magically comes into view. It should look like this ⬇️
Invisible ink experiment (Copyright KSAT 2023 - All rights reserved)

HOW IT WORKS

Chemical Reaction

Baking soda is a base while the grape juice is an acid. Whenever an acid and a base combine, some sort of chemical reaction occurs. In this case, the baking soda and water solution turns a darker color, becoming visible!

SCIENCE WITH SARAH

If you’d like Sarah and David to come to your school and conduct a science experiment live on KSAT, email sciencewithsarah@ksat.com.

Parents and guardians: upload a video of your child performing the activity by clicking here. Send it in and you might see it on GMSA @ 9 a.m.!

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About the Authors
Sarah Spivey headshot

Sarah Spivey is a San Antonio native who grew up watching KSAT. She has been a proud member of the KSAT Weather Authority Team since 2017. Sarah is a Clark High School and Texas A&M University graduate. She previously worked at KTEN News. When Sarah is not busy forecasting, she enjoys hanging out with her husband and cat, and playing music.

Robert Samarron headshot
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