monday, october 5, 2015

Just to do something different, I sent out a survey/hypothesis for all of the students in 4th grade.  Tomorrow we will be doing an experiment on heat conductivity and I am going to be demonstrating this in both Ms. Apoldo's class as well as mine.  In order to maximize our time, I would like to have the students choose beforehand which of the three statements they most agree with:

1. Steel is a better heat conductor than aluminum
2. Aluminum is a better heat conductor than steel
3. Both steel and aluminum conduct heat at the same rate

This is not an actual homework assignment but if I could get as many students as possible to make their prediction ahead of time, that would be ideal since time is at a premium.  I can compile the data into a graph and show it before the experiment (minus the student names - just the data).
By "better" or "best" I mean taking a clamping thermocouple and measuring temperature ≅ every 10 cm and comparing results.  

Here is the form if needed:

​However, today's focus was on density.  The students have learned that density refers to how tightly packed molecules of matter are in a specific item.  But first, we had the warm-up:

Afterwards, we reviewed the notes and added one thing:

​Luster:  the way a mineral reflects light.

​Before doing the experiment, we reviewed the basic steps of the scientific method.

Then we reviewed density:

Here is the correct response:

Once all of the reviewing was out of the way, it was time to actually DO the experiment.  I had on-hand six different liquids:  water, corn syrup, rubbing alcohol, corn oil, dish soap, and milk.  

There are three more ingredients that can be used but are expensive so I opted not to use them since it was too late to ask parents:  honey, pure maple syrup, and lamp oil.

After having the students make their predictions, I went ahead and poured in the liquids.  The proper order is:  (honey) corn syrup (maple syrup), milk, dish soap, water, vegetable oil, and rubbing alcohol (and then lamp oil if available).  Below is a slide show and then below that is what it SHOULD look like.  I have never been able to make mine look as good as in the photo.

Then it was time for JA Biztown.  The students got back in their groups to complete two tasks:  webpage and sign ad.  Tomorrow's task will be to create a radio ad and that will be 90% of it all.  Wednesday will be the early release day and that will be devoted to finishing up anything incomplete.   Since it is a much shorter day, I don't have anything planned in science.  Thursday will see the finalization of everything but we will do science.