Goop

If you haven’t ever played with goop (cornstarch and water) before, you need to. Every once in awhile I purchase a 64 cent box of generic cornstarch at Walmart whip up a batch of goop, that lovely material that’s neither a liquid or a solid. My kids love it, and I can’t stop playing with it either. Last night there was one hour between finishing supper and bedtime, and I thought to myself, that’s the perfect amount of time to play with goop.

Destructoman was just a baby when I made the last batch of goop, and his reaction to it was quite interesting. He just isn’t the messmaker that Ms. Crazy Preschooler is. STUFF on his hands really bothers him. So for about a half an hour he just watched very intently, adamant that no goop touched his fingers, but after awhile he couldn’t resist. The most fun was tipping the bowls of goop upside down and watching them drip like liquid icicles onto the table.

And for the amount of mess we made, goop really cleans up easily. The table and chairs were covered with cornstarch, as was the floor and window. There was a conspicious trail of cornstarch leading to the bathroom, and our clothes were pretty much white and crunchy by the time we were done, but with just a few wipes while the munchkins played in the bathtub, things were pretty much back to normal.

I would have taken some pictures, but I didn’t want to get my camera full of cornstarch. The whole experience really made me want to be an English teacher again for a bit. I envision a whole poetry lesson plan revolving around goop: making goop in the classroom, playing in the ooze for fifteen to twenty minutes, filling out a graphic organizer full of sensory words to describe goop, and amazing student-written poems as the result. Alas, where was goop five years ago?????