Category Archives: Science

Science – Getting Messy!

5th Grade, Science, , ,

Today in class, we did a series of experiments. We tested how colored sugar reacted to oil, water, and white vinegar. The liquids were the solvent and the sugar was the solute. First, we had to make the colored sugar by mixing sugar and pink food coloring.

Then, we tested the sugar with the oil. Our hypothesis was: If we mix 1 tsb of sugar with oil, then the sugar will gradually dissolve and color the oil. Our hypothesis was denied. We noticed that there were tiny particles floating and there is a thin layer of pink at the top. We also noted that the sugar was NOT coloring the oil and that most of the sugar was at the bottom.

Next, we tested the water and sugar. Our hypothesis was: If we mix 1 tsb of sugar with water, then the sugar will dissolve and color the water. Our hypothesis was confirmed. The sugar DID color the water and dissolved rapidly. It took a little bit of time, but by the time we came back from lunch, (1hr), it was all dissolved.

Finally, we tested the sugar with white vinegar. Our hypothesis was: If we mix 1 tsb of sugar with vinegar, then the sugar will color the vinegar and partially dissolve. Our hypothesis was confirmed. The sugar did color the vinegar and dissolved rapidly, although not all the way.

Overall, I learned so much from these experiments and had so much fun getting messy!

Science Centers

Science,

In class, we did science centers with our science groups. The first activity we did was called Create It! We had to sort beads by color and we observed the properties of the beads. We saw that the beads were hard, small, colored and square. Then we had to make a mixture out of the beads. We observed whether the properties of the beads changed or stayed the same. The properties of the beads did not change, but instead of one color, there were many.

Next, we did Sort It!. In Sort It!, we sorted mixtures, solutions and compounds into seperate piles. When we were done we had sand and water, sand and iron filing and salad in the mixture column. We put soda, sugar and water, and air into the solutions column and we put table salt baking soda and water into the compound column.

Next, we did Match It! In Match It!, we matched words and definitions. Here is what we learned: Physical Properties: a characteristic of matter, Mixture: a combination of 2 or more substances, Solution: a type of mixture in which one substance dissolves in another, Solvent: the substance that dissolves in another substance to make a solution, Solute:the substance in a solution that there is more of, and Dissolve: to break down into smaller pieces until it is invisible.\

Next we did Explain It!, In Explain It!, we made observations on the recipe of lemonade and then we wrote what we learned. I wrote that the hot water is the solvent, the sugar was the solute and if you add the cold water with the lemon to the hot water and the sugar, it’s a solution. I learned that you can mix a solvent and solute together add another liquid and you would still get a solution. I wonder if you didn’t mix the sugar and hot water, would the sugar still dissolve? If so, how long would it take?

Overall I learned so much from these activities and thought they were a lot of fun!

 

Rube Goldberg #7

5th Grade, Free Write, Science,

We finally finished our whole Rube Goldberg project, including our final video. We are so excited! In our video, we included our fails, our sketch and our success. We also included a little skit to introduce our goal; and to make it entertaining. We are super happy with the way it turned out, and I’m super excited to share it with you!

This is our Rube Goldberg!!!! Hope you enjoy!!!!

 

Rube Goldberg #6

5th Grade, Free Write, Science,

We finally finished our Rube Goldberg! It actually worked! We did fix the last part, but then after that, our beginning didn’t work! So, we played around with that, and finally getting it to work, we tested the whole machine a few times, and then recorded the final video. In the video we are putting together on Wevideo, we are also going to include our fails, like when the beginning wouldn’t work, and when we just started building. I’m so excited to show you the video in the final blogpost!

Rube Goldberg #5

5th Grade, Free Write, Science,

We are looking forward to testing again tomorrow. The one thing we have to fix is the last step. In the last step the car bumps into 2 boxes, the front one filled with chips. The second one to help the chips inside the box fall into the bowl. What’s happening is the chips spill everywhere, instead of into the bowl. We have been trying to make the chips go into the bowl in various different way, but none of them have worked. We are planning to sleep on it and look at it in a fresh perspective in the morning.

Rube Goldberg #4

5th Grade, Science,

We have started – and finished building our Rube Goldberg. It was so hard. We built a little, and then tested that part. If that part did not work we tweaked it. We did this over and over again. Eventually, we stopped this strategy and tried building it all without testing every little piece. This worked so much better. After the whole thing was complete, we started testing it. As we tested, we kept on finding and solving problems that stopped our Rube Goldberg from being successful. When one of our tweaks did not work we tweaked it. We went through lots of iterations of the last step, we just could not get it right. We are still testing and tweaking things, but are making steady progress forward…

Rube Goldberg #3

5th Grade, Free Write, Science,

We have changed our whole sketch. It now includes more simple machines, each step is changing from KE (kinetic energy) to PE (potential energy), and it is a lot more interesting. The simple machines we are using includes a lever, ramp and wheel and axle. We finished the sketch and are happy with the way it turned out, and we didn’t even have to scrap our old pieces we built for the other sketch. We are using them in our new design. I will update you more when we start building again!

Recycling

5th Grade, Free Write, Science, ,

Today Monica came in. She taught us how to reuse things, such as tin foil. The 1st assignment was to make something for ourselves out of 1 sheet of tin foil. I made a hat and decorated it in orange marker. Our 2nd assignment was to disassemble the things we made for ourselves (in my case, a hat) and use that to make something for a partner. I made a pair of mittens/hand warmers and again colored them orange. My partner made me a bracelet using tin foil and some very bad play-doh. Note: In the end we had to disassemble the items we made. Our 3rd assignment was to make some sort of tool that could pick up/sort bottle caps and such. This we had to do with only 3 or 4 people. Our 4th and last assignment was to work together in groups of 8 to sort through the bottle caps, etc. Within our groups we paired up into 2’s. Each pair created a tool with 3 pieces and were in charge of sorting a specific kind of bottle caps (clear, white, orange…). Overall today was really fun and I learned a lot from this experience.

Rube Goldberg #2

5th Grade, Free Write, Science

We still haven’t started building our Rube Goldberg yet, but have completed our first iteration sketch. It consists of 8 steps. Step #1: Push the marble. Step #2: The marble rolls down the curved cardboard tube. Step #3: The marble rolls out of the cardboard tube and rolls onto a binder, it rolls off the binder and falls onto another binder, and rolls down that binder. Step #4: The marble rolls off the binder and through two open notebooks. Step #5: The marble rolls off the notebooks and goes down a slide-like, cut open cardboard tube. Step #6: Marble rolls out of the cut open cardboard tube and knocks over a cardboard box. Step #7: The cardboard box that was knocked down by the marble, knocks down the open chip bag. Step #8:  The chips from the bag fall into the bowl at the bottom. That is our first sketch.

Feb 28, 2019

We are now using a different sketch

Rube Goldberg #1

5th Grade, Free Write, Science

On January 28, my class started a project about Rube Goldberg. The assignment is to build a complicated machine, that does a very simple thing. Our goal (Julia and I) is to put snacks in a bowl. Our material list includes; cardboard tubes, marbles, a chair, books, binders, a cardboard box, tape, glue and White Cheddar Corn Puffs. We decided to use stairs, because if we did it on a flat surface the ball might not get enough speed or might stop in the middle of the machine. We are really excited to start building and to test it. It’s going to be so much fun!

March 4, 2019

We are not using all of these materials anymore.