Get messy with our recipe for Gloop – a strange, mysterious mixture that can’t decide whether it is liquid or solid. And Augustus? Well it is August isn’t it? And after all, August is named after the Roman emperor Augustus Caesar.

You will need:

• An adult to help you
• Cornflour
• Water
• Dessertspoon
• Cereal dish
• Red and green food colouring

What to do:

1. Spoon eight level dessertspoonfuls of cornflour into the dish.
2. Add four dessertspoonfuls of water.
3. Now add a few drops of each of the food colourings till you get a nice chocolaty brown colour. Be careful with this part as food colourings can stain material and your skin.  If this happens you will be about as popular as Augustus Gloop at an Eat-All-You-Can Buffet! Make sure you ask an adult to help you.
4. Mix slowly and carefully so that no white powder can be seen.
5. Now poke a finger gently into the gloop and move it slowly in a circle.  See how it moves through the liquid?  Try moving it quickly.  What’s going on?  It won’t let your finger move!
6. Notice how the mixture feels dry when you squeeze it between your fingers?  And feels wet as it drips off your fingers?

What’s happening?

The cornflour and water mixture is a mixture of solid particles suspended in a liquid. This is called a "colloid". When you stir the mix slowly, the cornflour particles can move around in the water quite freely, and so it acts as a liquid. But when you stir the mix faster or hold it in your hand tightly, the solid particles rub against each other causing friction. This makes them stick together and act like a solid.

And don’t forget – when you’ve had enough fun, don’t wash it down the sink, scrape it into the bin with the rest of the rubbish.  Sorry Veruca, we didn’t mean to remind you of the rubbish chute; it’s just that the gloop might clog up the drains. And if you wonder why that might happen – good for you! You’re a true scientist in the making.  Here’s why: Leave your gloop in the dish overnight.  In the morning you will notice a layer of water on the top and your gloop will be a solid layer at the bottom.  This is because the cornflour does not dissolve in the water and separates out.  This solid layer would sit in the U-bend of your sink if it were not properly flushed away. This means that the sink would not drain away properly and someone would be in for a roasting!

Enough of all that, what’s happening on the Web?