Welcome to Steve Spangler Science. Skip directly to: main content, navigation, search box.

Vanishing Jelly Marbles Kit

Make a secret message and more with these polymer marbles

  • Vanishing Jelly Marbles Kit
    Item #: WVJM-500

    $9.99 In Stock

Usually ships out the next day.

Recommend for 8 years & up with adult supervision.

Your audience won’t believe their eyes when you “magically” uncover a secret message with this Jelly Marble polymer demonstration kit.  Just add water and watch these tiny spheres turn into big jelly-like marbles.  Then teach a captivating lesson about light and polymer when you hide and then uncover your own secret message.  We’ll even throw in some regular marbles, so you can prove to any skeptics in your audience that Jelly Marbles are not your average marble! 

The Vanishing Jelly Marbles Kit is also a great object lesson. Don't just tell your students that the Jelly Marbles will disappear and why, give them some science fun. Are you teaching your lesson in March? Perfect! The Vanishing Jelly Marbles are magical Leprechaun eggs. If your lesson is in the fall around Halloween, these Jelly Marbles are perfect ghost droppings or eggs. The possibilities are as limitless as the human mind. Recommended for children ages 8 and up.

What's included?

  • Clear plastic pie pan
  • 10 grams of Jelly Marbles
  • 7 gram vile
  • 3 glass marbles

How does it work?

It looks like an ordinary glass of water... crystal clear water. But hiding just below the surface of the water are an amazing collection of large, jelly-like marbles that become invisible when submerged in water. The Jelly Marbles become invisible due to an identical index of refraction with the water. In other words, they vanish like magic! As you'll see, there's more to this experiment than meets the eye.

What does it teach?

With the Vanishing Jelly Marbles Kit, students will learn lessons in light refraction and refraction index as well as the magic of superabsorbent polymers. Add in some object lessons and scientific experiences and you've given your young scientists an experiment that they'll never forget.

Science Fair Connection:

Watching full grown Jelly Marbles vanish in water is pretty cool, but it isn't a science fair project. You can create a science fair project by identifying a variable, or something that changes, in the Vanishing Jelly Marbles experiment. Let's take a look at some of the variable options that might work:

  • Use what you learned about the light refraction of Jelly Marbles to test more liquids.
  • Compare the Jelly Marbles to other "clear" objects, like the glass marbles in the kit.

That's just a couple of ideas, but you aren't limited to those! Come up with different variables and give them a try. Remember, you can only change one thing at a time. If you are testing different liquids, make sure that the other factors remain the same!

Product FAQ

Warning - Small Ball Choking Hazard

Soooooooo Cool

Kayla    -  August 10, 2012

1 2 3 4 5
This user gave 5/5 stars


I love them. I freaked out my pastor when I told him to put his hand in a ice cream bucket full of them. :)

vanishing marbles

Julie Ley    -  September 2, 2011

1 2 3 4 5
This user gave 5/5 stars


The vanishing marbles were awesome. My 5 year old son loves science as well as magic. this product is a great combination of both and simple enough for a young child. We have shown the magic trick to many adults and gotten "wows". I greatly recommend it for even kindergarten age children.

Pretty Cool

Monica Shadid    -  May 24, 2011

1 2 3 4 5
This user gave 5/5 stars


This was a hit at my son's 9th Mad Scientist Birthday Party!

Perfect for Polymer and your Senses too...

Michelle    -  April 19, 2011

1 2 3 4 5
This user gave 5/5 stars


I can't say enough about how great these marbles are. I used them for a class in a week long series of polymers and Optics. I know it sounds like a strange combination of topics, but these marbles, combined with what a magnifying glass does with the sun to wood, I was effectively able to explain, display and convey a lesson that all small children should know - Never Look Directly At The Sun.

After showing the effects of the sun on wood/paper, the children were told about the lenses in their eyes and how they would do the same thing to the back of the eye the brain gets the info to see. Only one child truly made the connection that day.

But then when all the children were able to have these fully saturated marbles in hand, I was able to get 19 1st graders to get the "feel" of these as eye balls and their hands as the back of their eyes. They quickly made the connection of how their eyes worked. They all said they didn't want the sun burning their eyes. We went on to discuss how sunglasses help with blocking some sun rays but that there was no safe way short of using a sun filter (that they couldn't go to the local store and buy) to look directly or reflectively at the sun. It amazed me how much they took it to heart about the safety of their eyes after being able to hold something that they perceived "felt mushy" like their own eyes and produced the same effect as the magnifying glass. I don't think I every could have completely made the connection with such young kids without the aid of this tool Thank you so much!

AWESOME

Mike O'Connell St. Louis MIssouri   -  November 14, 2009

1 2 3 4 5
This user gave 5/5 stars


I found out about these from the Steve Spangler video on YouTube. I knew I had to get some to play around with. My friends' minds are all totally blown now.

Write your own review for this product.