IN THE CLASSROOM:Messing around with science

It’s the pastime of thousands of children. It’s the irritant of parents who foot the grocery bill. But at Newport Heights Elementary School last week, it was science, pure and simple.

In the multipurpose room during lunch on Tuesday, one class after another filed in to do the classic fizzy science experiment: combining baking soda and vinegar. When the two substances are combined, they create salt, which stays at the bottom of the cup, and soda water, which releases carbon dioxide.

In other words, they bubble, surge and run all over the place.

A group of students from Newport Harbor High School’s Da Vinci Academy helped moderate the experiment, and for an hour or so, they got to remember what it was like to be young and loose in the pantry.

“No! Don’t drink it!” sophomore Leah Prather, 16, told a kindergartner who tried to sample the mixture. “Believe me, you won’t like it.”

The PTA-funded experiment, which the Newport Harbor students put on for nearly every grade level, came two days before Newport Heights’ annual science fair on Thursday. Parent Wendy Maurer, who is in charge of science for the PTA, said the school opted for a fun, hands-on experiment to prepare students for the more elaborate displays later in the week.

“We’re going to let them just go to town,” Maurer said.

Four members of the Da Vinci Academy — Leah, Shelby Searles, Alex Penewell and Corinne Schneiders, along with teacher Julie Karjala — supervised the tables and dispensed baking soda and vinegar to the Newport Heights students. Karjala said the event marked the first time that the academy, which centers around math and science, had volunteered with younger kids.

A larger group from the Da Vinci Academy visited the science fair on Thursday to do more hands-on experiments. Around 270 students participated in the fair, which encompassed the three upper grades at Newport Heights.

Tuesday’s lab, which continued through lunchtime, served as a preview. The academy members armed themselves with two huge bottles of vinegar — 10 liters in all — and set out a new paper tablecloth for every group of students. A few of the younger kids said they had experimented with baking soda and vinegar before, but for a few, watching those bubbles surge was a first-time experience.

“I didn’t think it was going to explode like that,” said first-grader Owen Maldonado-Barrios, 7.