An inquiry based activity that I have enjoyed doing with my class in the past is making a rainbow and showing the distribution of colours within the rainbow.
Materials:
coffee filter paper
water-based markers
water spray bottle
Method:
The children open up the coffee filter paper and lay it out flat. It naturally makes a butterfly shape so I usually add a pipe cleaner down the middle as the butterfly’s body at the end. I then encourage the children to use different coloured markers to create a pattern on the filter paper. When they are finished we spray water all over the filter paper butterfly with the spray bottle. I then hang the filter paper up and we watch as the colours begin to separate and bleed into each other to create a beautiful butterfly pattern. Young children are always intrigued with this process and the end result is always stunning. They particularly like to see the black separating into all the colours of the rainbow.