25 Things to Do with a Switch Activated Pouring Cup

1. pour glitter onto a craft project
2. pour sand into bottle to make sand art
3. pour paint onto a Spin Art Machine
4. water plants
5. roll dice (especially fun for multiple dice games like Yathzee and Boggle)
6. set up dominoes to be toppled, attach a ruler or cardboard to the cup and knock 'em down
7. combine chemicals to make silly putty or oobleck
8. pour crushed Oreos on top of "dirt cups"
9. add the chocolate to milk
10. fill plastic ziploc baggies with liquid dishsoap to make freezer packs for lunchs and boo-boos (soap is gel like and takes longer to defrost so is better than water)
11. fill bags with ice for the trainers office or the school nurse as community service
12. measure ingredients for a cooking project
13. toss a handful of coins for a probability experiment
14. drop blocks onto a fragile surface (like damp tissue paper over a trashcan) to experiment on how much weight will cause the surface to break
15. use two pouring cups and drop items from a height to see which falls faster
16. blindfold a contestant and drop different items so the contestant can guess what you are dropping
17. drop a ball onto a slope to learn about velocity
18. fill the class pet's food dish
19. dump fish food in the tank
20. fill the candy dish before important IEP meetings
21. pour coins into the coin sorter/wrapper
22. position the pouring cup over someone's head and allow the winner of a contest to activate it to pour ice cold water or ice cubes down that person's back
23. tape the cloth covering a surprise to the edge of the cup and press the switch to unveil the item
24. remove the cup, attach an arrow and use it as a choosing device 
25. write the names of every student on a small wooden block and pour out a block a day to pick the day's helper at random

Device of the Day - Switch Activated Pouring Cup on a Flexible Mount

This product, a switch activated measuring cup mounted on a flexible gooseneck mount, from Enabling Devices ($122.95) is my first Device of the Day. I acquired one just this past September, thinking I would use it for cooking lessons.

I have used it for cooking, and so much more. I've used it in science to measure and pour experiment ingredients, in math to teach measuring liquids, in art to drop glitter and sand onto projects and in even in history when we made Silly Putty in a lesson on 1940's inventions. This device is limited only by creativity.

Another bonus (that admittedly I viewed as a drawback at first) is that one switch will pour while a second switch with upright the measuring cup. This design creates teamwork between my students who use switches in handling the measuring and pouring. (You can also just move the switch from one port to another). This nifty device has many uses in the intensive special needs classroom.