Ice Breakers

Almost no creatures are able to live in Antarctica all year long. The largest is an insect that measures less than half an inch. But this wasn’t always the case. Millions of years ago, when the continent is thought to have been attached to Australia, dinosaurs roamed a much warmer Antarctica. We know this because several dinosaur fossils have been uncovered from deep in the ice of Antarctica. In the book Arctic & Antarctic we see some impressive examples of fern and shellfish fossils that also point to a warmer climate at one time. Today, the only plants that can survive are lichens, liverworts and mosses.

We decide to play paleontologist for a day. I start by filling a large plastic container with ice cubes and some small plastic dinosaurs (I put them in upside down so that they will be right side up when we flip the container over).

Cover the dinosaurs with some more ice and fill with cold water. Set inside a freezer for at least a few hours.

Remove the block of ice from the container and flip upside down onto a baking sheet.

Now for the fun part: the kids take turns trying to break the ice.

We know that in Antarctica some of the sheets of ice are 2.5 miles deep! The kids can’t imagine trying to break through that. Chips are flying off but the ice is much harder to break than we thought it would be.