Noon recess is over. One student has already asked what the gallon jugs of glue and liquid starch in the corner are for. "Slime," explains the teacher brightly. "We're having slime week since it's the 100th day of school on Wednesday." The students, especially the boys, look skeptical. As the students come in, they gather around, watching the teacher dump glue and shaving cream into Cool Whip containers. The fun begins...
Girls group:
Teacher: OK, now mix this liquid starch in just a little at a time until it isn't sticky.
Girls: Start mixing in the starch, all the while dramatically exclaiming and talking among themselves, trying to get their slime perfect. Soon they are mixing in colors, ooing and awwing over each other's slime, squishing it around happily.
Boys group:
Teacher: OK, now mix this liquid starch in just a little at a time until it isn't sticky.
Teacher walks a few feet away to check on the girls; returns to find a boy stirring runny shaving cream goop. She gives them a little more liquid starch, then goes to check on the girls again. She turns around to find the boys stirring a now even more liquidey goop.
Boys: Ours is weird! It doesn't look like the girls'. One boy dips both hands in the goop. "Oooh, will this wash off? It will probably plug the drain."
Teacher: Hmmm...
Teacher gets more glue and adds it. Soon she ends up dumping the whole mess onto the desk and kneading it like bread. She slaps it like a bread loaf, and the boys jump back from the slime splatters, guffawing.
Girls (squishing their perfect slime): Oooo! Yours is so weird and stringy!
Boys: Hey, it's like brains! They add their food coloring, blue and green, and we soon have beautiful mint colored stringy brain slime. One boy takes the brain thing too far. He starts adding red food coloring, and the class gathers around as he squishes it... brains, kidneys, liver, guts... and yes, at some point it does like all of the above! Then he adds some yellow, and the only way I can describe the effect is to say that it looked just like the stuff that comes out of a crawfish when you peel it. By now, another boy has the strings all squished out of his slime, so he wants a straw. Soon everyone is crazy with laughter because of all the strange fart noises his slime is making as he blows huge bubbles. The guy with the brain slime tries it too, and his slime inflates and deflates like lungs. He holds it up and it stretches out like a massively long tongue. The boys' slime is smooth now, but stiffer than the girls' and yes, it bounces. We get a slime ball juggling demonstration.
And it's after 1 o'clock. Our "childish"slime fun comes to an end, but Ziploc bags are one everyone's desks for the rest of the day. "Slime is better than a fidget spinner!" says one student, and I have to agree.