Upon becoming a parent, I read the book ‘Slow Death By Rubber Ducky: How the Toxic Chemistry of Everyday Life Affects Our Health’ which outlined the dangers that exist with chemicals in our personal products, food and toys. Many of the case studies and chemicals that were outlined in this book described chemicals that are not good for the environment or our bodies. It made me think twice about using certain products on small children and so I began a journey into making my own products from laundry soap to sunscreen. As my children have grown, their interests in personal care products have lead me to expand my wheelhouse so that I can keep up with current trends and include products such as lip balms and bath products. As such, I decided to experiment with bath bombs.
As a teacher, I started to expand my curriculum into including autonomous projects for students such as ‘Genius Hour’ where students select a topic that relates to science and spends one hour of class time per week developing this project until the end of the semester. One of my students chose to research bath bombs for her Genius Hour. As I watched her presentation, I realized this was the perfect way to blend my interests in knowing the ingredients that go into your personal care products with teaching and developing inquiry skills in the classroom.
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