Hello and Welcome to the Big Book of fun Science Experiments!

Transcription

1 Cover Image Courtesy of: Wikipedia Big Book of Science Experiments Gr1-6 Hello and Welcome to the Big Book of fun Science Experiments! This book is about science experiments that you can do in the home and experiments that you can nag your teacher to do in school. Table of Contents Description Page Acid investigations 3 Baking Powder and Lemon Juice 4 Build your own periscope 5 Chromatography of inks 6 Electricity from Lemons 7 Fun with Baking Powder and Vinegar 8 Grow Your Own Crystals 10 Grow Your Own Fungi 11 Guide a Termite 12 How to make a Needle float, and How to make it sink 13 Keep your mouse warm 14 Make a colourful flower 15 Make a floating compass 16 Make a spinning paper helicopter 17 Make a switch 18 Making rainbows in liquids 19 Pinhole Camera 21 Power a boat with soap 23 Raisin Dance 25 Red cabbage indicator 26 Slime recipes 27 Test floating 28 The fantastic squirting egg 30 Write secret messages 32 Acknowledgements and TOU 34 Please ensure adequate adult supervision and safety precautions when undertaking any experiments with children. Use of the content of this book is done so entirely at the user s own risk. By making use of the material contained herein you hereby agree to the terms of use and absolve Donnette E Davis and/or St Aiden s Homeschool and/or her/its duly appointed representative from any liability whatsoever either directly or indirectly as a result of making use of the material in this book. Compiled in A4 format, please adjust your printer settings. Thank you. 2

2 Acid Investigations - It is ACID! Isn't it cool? These are the types of food and drink that contain acid: Foods Lemons Oranges Grapes Grapefruits Tomatoes Drinks Fruity drinks Fizzy drinks. Experiment: First get a glass of milk. Then slice a lemon in half and squeeze one half until the drops of lemon juice come out. Have the glass of milk ready underneath. Then taste. Is there any difference? Principle The milk should taste considerably different because the small quantities of juice from the lemon have large quantities of Citric Acid. Citric Acid is common in many foods because it cheap and potent (meaning that it has a strong taste). Acidity is a measurement of the activity of hydrogen atoms in a molecule. This is measured on something called a ph scale, where anything below a 7 is an acid; anything above a 7 is a base. When the acid and base mix, they create a reaction, which breaks bonds between the molecules of the acids and bases. In some cases, this reaction can produce heat (which is why many cartoons show acids as being able to burn through steel and other materials). 3

3 Baking Powder and Lemon Squash - A chemical reaction that you can drink; and you don't get chemical burns! 1. Take out a clean shiny glass. 2. Add lemon, orange, or summer fruits squash and pour it in. 3. Take a pinch of baking powder. If you use the summer fruits squash, which is pink, the frothy bubbles will be pink!! Watch your amazing experiment bubble! 4

4 Build your own periscope - WOW! It now takes even LESS energy to look around corners. What an age we live in! Do you like spying? If you do that's very good. We are going to make a periscope today. You will need: 2 small mirrors sticky tape scissors rectangular box Directions 1. First, cut out a hole just big enough to fit the mirror into the bottom of one side. 2. Then do the same on the top of the other side. Place the mirrors into the holes so that they fit snugly in the corner, and use the tape to keep them there. 3. When you look through one slit, you should see out the other. 5

5 Chromatography of inks Get some filter paper - use a coffee machine filter or ask your science teacher for some (say please, it isn't free) - water and pens. First you put pen marks on the filter paper then stand it up right in a beaker of water then all the colours will separate. Principle Solubility describes how easily things will dissolve in water or other liquids, called solvents. Normally, the longer you leave something in water, the more it will dissolve. Some colours in the ink from the pens will dissolve more easily than others; as the water soaks up the paper, it carries the ink with it. The more easily one colour dissolves, the further it travels. 6

6 Electricity from Lemons - Yep, those juices you put in your highly conductive drinking water have the potential to store electricity! Amazing! To make a lemon battery you will need: A lemon A penny A nickel Copper wire An LED. Experiment: First, use some wire to cover a penny and other piece of wire on the nickel. Insert the coins in the lemon and put the other sides of the wires in the sides of the LED. Then you will see the electric power of the lemon flowing in the diode. 7