Just For Fun

Before we move on and look at how heat changes matter, I wanted to do a simple but fun experiment with Selena.

I gave Selena an empty water bottle and marked it with a black line, she had to put water in it just up to this line. I asked her what would happen if we put this in the freezer. Of course she said the water would turn to ice. I asked her if she thought there would be any other changes, and she said no the freezer will slow the molecules down binding them together to make ice.

We put it in the freezer and left it there for 24 hours. Selena got quite a surprise when we took it out the next day.

She didn’t expect that the ice would extend above our marked water line. There was truly nothing left to do then to sit it on our counter and allow it to thaw. Selena had to make a hypothesis as to rather there would be the same amount of water we started with or more. She was kind of stumped on this question and only said “I truly do not know.”

She tried to mark where the ice came to on the bottle but due to the cold the pen wouldn’t mark on it. Great thinking there though.

She finally got the answer to her dilemma, when the ice melted she had the same amount of water as she did when she started. She had fun with this experiment, while it was very simple, just the amazement of the frozen water having denser properties, being heavier and expanding like it did was quite a thrill for her.

Is Air Matter

On our quest to understand Chemistry, chemical reactions, and properties of matter I had to ask the one question that many get stumped on, “Is air matter?” Selena didn’t take long to answer my question with, “Yes, air is made of molecules.”

I handed Selena an empty dry water jug with the cap on it and asked her what was inside it. At first she said, “Nothing.” I questioned her answer, and she thought about it for a minute or two and announced, “Air, there is air inside.” I again asked her if air is matter? How can we prove rather it is matter or not? Selena thought a bit and asked if we could heat the air up? I asked her to remind me of the two environments she can think of that will change matter. She answered with “Heat and Cold.” We then decided that maybe if we made the air cold we could see if it is indeed matter.

We placed the jug in the refrigerator. At this point Selena truly had no ideas or hypothesis as to what would happen, making this simple experiment even more mysterious for her. Then we went about our normal morning routine.

As I served up lunch I had Selena retrieve the water jug out of the refrigerator, her first observations were the now indentations of the bottle. As we sat down to eat lunch I had her place the jug in the middle of the table. I asked her what she thought had happened to the air in the jug to make it sink in like that? Selena didn’t take long before she answered, “The cold made the molecules in the air slow down making them bind together.”

As we ate our lunch we began to hear, “POP”, “POP”, “POP”. Selena was excited to see that the indentations in the jug had now popped out and looked like the jug looked like it did when we put it in the refrigerator. Again I asked her now what has happened to the air in the jug? She quickly thought about it and answered, the molecules warmed up and got bigger?” I asked her if by getting bigger did she mean expanded? She agreed that is what she meant. So now I asked is air matter? She came back to her first answer, “Yes, air is definitely matter because it has molecules.” I corrected her answer of the matter getting bigger and explained that as the molecules heated up they became faster again, breaking apart expanding in the space to make the bottle pop back to it’s original shape. 

How Does Dish soap Work?

Yesterday morning one of the first questions that came out of Selena’s mouth as we were preparing breakfast was, “How does dish soap work?” I told her that was a great question and we would explore that. She wanted to put it in her question box, but I have discovered that while we have put a few questions in her question box, they don’t necessarily come back out to be answered. I told her after breakfast we would answer her question.

Using 4 small containers I placed oil in one, heavy cream in another and the last one just for fun I put sticky honey. We grabbed the green food coloring so we could see the affects of the dish soap in our experiment.

First we had a discussion on how foods contain, fats, oils or grease, and we both know how sticky things can get in the pan, hence the honey. I also explained how dish soap is formulated to break apart the binding elements found in most fats and oils, as well as enzymes that break down food particles.

We started with the oil by placing 5 drops of green food coloring in it. Selena’s first observation was that the oil caused the food coloring to form small round beads that just floated on top of the oil.

When we placed a drop of dish soap the first observation that Selena noticed was that the soap started causing these beads of food coloring to break apart and disperse into the oil. I second guessed her hypothesis of what she was seeing, and she came to the conclusion that the dish soap in fact was breaking down the oil making it possible for the beaded food coloring to disperse.

A few more drops of soap and this is what we had in the picture above.

When we dropped the food coloring into the heavy cream, Selena’s observation was that the food coloring did not bead up like in the oil, but made a bit larger blobs, that just rested on top of the cream.

One drop of dish soap was quite a surprise to Selena as it seemed to push the food coloring off to the sides, but also at the same time they lost their rounded shape.

With a couple more drops of dish soap the food coloring dispersed through the heavy cream.

A few drops of food coloring on the sticky honey. Selena’s first observations was that like the rest the food coloring just rested in round globs or bead like, but in the honey they were even larger circles.

Look what one drop of dish soap did here! Now this was very amazing to Selena as the food coloring swirled around in the honey.

We then had a little fun combining drops of the oil and honey into the heavy cream. It was fun to see how each one revealed a different course depending upon it’s make-up.

A few more drops of soap and a few wishing around the container and we could see the full affect of the soap creating suds, and the cream curdling a bit, the oil breaking up and the honey dispersing through the mixture.

Chemistry Lesson 1

First of all we needed to define What is Chemistry? I didn’t want to go into a long discussion that I knew would be totally over the top of Selena’s head, so instead I had her reflect on many of the experiments we have done in our home and the observations she has been making lately. She quickly identified that heat changes things, cold changes things, and she even remembered that an acid such as Vinegar can create some fun fizzing when added to baking powder.

Her definition of Chemistry was, “The observations of everything in our world and how they change or react with other things.” She went on to add, “How we question the world around us, and make hypothesis which we then test.”

To move on to some fun supporting experiments to support her definition, I allowed her to choose 5 different items from our kitchen, then she had to find one more item besides vinegar that was an acid base.

She chose from top of plate to bottom: Baking Soda, Flour, Sugar, Cinnamon, and Salt. We already knew we would use Vinegar, so her other item she guessed was an acid base was a lemon.

Selena made a hypothesis on what would happen when we added the Vinegar to these items. Of course she already knew that Vinegar and Baking Soda fizzed. She expected the Vinegar and the other ingredients to do the same thing.

She was quite surprised to our results.

Baking Soda and Vinegar fizzed, Flour and Vinegar the vinegar actually moved away from the flour. Sugar and Vinegar the Sugar absorbed the Vinegar (but at a rate that appeared as though you could watch the vinegar moving across the sugar.) The Cinnamon and Vinegar was very surprising and exciting, as the Vinegar actually jumped away from the Cinnamon. The Salt and Vinegar again like the sugar absorbed the Vinegar, but quickly and not as easily to see the movement of the vinegar through the salt.

The results with the Lemon were very much the same as with the Vinegar, but with more intensity. It was fun to really watch the lemon juice jump away from the cinnamon.

As I am typing this Selena is listing other observations she wants to make on the white board, she has listed how heat changes water, she is drawing her guess using small circles to represent droplets and atoms. Stay tuned as we have more fun exploring the world of Chemistry. 

Chemistry Questions

Selena has been asking so many wonderful questions lately that are related to Chemistry. Why does heat make eggs change? Why did the water jug pop after you took it out of the refrigerator and left it on the counter? Why does this dissolve in water, while that doesn’t? Way too many questions to really list here, but many of her questions have been great Chemistry questions.

In a search to how we would tackle these mysteries and more I came upon a site called Chem4Kids.com. I guess you know that we will be taking a little walk down Chemistry lane. I knew she was getting pretty curious about this subject when we were talking about our World, and I would write the Chemical Symbol for different things we were talking about like Oxygen, Water, and Carbon Dioxide.

I have printed quite a bit of material from the above site, as well as found a nice printable desk size Periodic Table of Elements from here. We will also have a lot of fun with many different experiments using common home products. Stay tuned to see everything we do. I think this is going to be a fun time in our homeschool.