On October 18th we began to work in the lab, learning how to mass solids and liquids. Kids learned to use the gram scale balance to measure mass and to measure the volume of a liquid using a graduated cylinder. We reviewed the calculations needed to measure the volume of a block or a cylinder and learned how to calculate the volume of an irregularly shaped object by using the indirect method of water displacement. Then the kids learned how to calculate the density of various objects and liquids, including water, by dividing mass by volume. This makes sense, since density is the amount of matter per unit volume.
Everyone had a great time learning to use the equipment to calculate densities. These lab activities have also helped the kids learn to identify physical characteristics of matter, such as color, volume, mass, density, transparency and smell.
The kids especially enjoyed using the Density Cube set, where they could see for themselves how cubes made of different substances, such as brass, pinewood and acrylic, occupy the same amount of space, i.e. have the same volume, but have vastly different densities because of their respective masses being different.
Hello everyone, and welcome back! A new school year has started, and Ann Arbor Open's 7th and 8th grade science classes have been busy learning, discussing, measuring, calculating, hypothesizing, predicting, analyzing and having fun! We began the year by studying experimental design, where the students tried to determine whether there was a benefit to using a particular method when memorizing a random list of 20 words. The students were very creative in coming up with different methods: these ranged from alphabetizing the words, to putting the words to a song, to writing stories with the words, to drawing a picture for each word. We learned about identifying dependent and independent variables, significant differences and distinguishing between a hypothesis and a prediction. Most of September was dedicated to designing, executing and analyzing these experiments, with much attention given to producing a formal, written presentation of the experimental design, results and conclusions.
An exciting coincidence is that on October 11, 2010, the New York Times Science section published an article about memory and activity, "Taking Early Retirement May Retire Memory, Too" where they tested the memories of retired and non-retired people between the ages of 60 and 64 by asking them to memorize and recall random word lists!
On September 21st and 22nd, around the time of the Autumn Equinox, we took a break to review the reason for the seasons (i.e. the tilt of the earth's axis)! Many students played the parts of the sun and the earth with great enthusiasm!
More to come soon on our studies of mass, volume and density1
On October 18th we began to work in the lab, learning how to mass solids and liquids. Kids learned to use the gram scale balance to measure mass and to measure the volume of a liquid using a graduated cylinder. We reviewed the calculations needed to measure the volume of a block or a cylinder and learned how to calculate the volume of an irregularly shaped object by using the indirect method of water displacement. Then the kids learned how to calculate the density of various objects and liquids, including water, by dividing mass by volume. This makes sense, since density is the amount of matter per unit volume.
Everyone had a great time learning to use the equipment to calculate densities. These lab activities have also helped the kids learn to identify physical characteristics of matter, such as color, volume, mass, density, transparency and smell.
