Sunday, December 8, 2019

Christmas poem

Image result for christmasC rackers bursting everywhere you look….POP!
“Ho ho ho,” the fat jolly man says merrily.
Reindeer dutifully follow Rudolph to all the houses.
In the Northern Hemisphere, there is lots of snow.
Stockings and sacks get filled then emptied by excited children.
Trees are lathered in bright ornaments and tinsel.
Mistletoe brings everyone together
A tradition that comes and goes every year
Santa and his elves work busily throughout the year, preparing the gifts for Christmas.
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Tuesday, December 3, 2019

Ice fishing experiment

Ice Fishing 
Aim/Purpose:
To see how salt can affect ice or react with ice


Materials 
  • Small paper cups, bowl or an ice cube tray
  • Glass of water
  • String (yarn or kite string works great)
  • Small stick
  • Salt
Steps/Method:
  1. Fill the cup or tray up with water and place it in the freezer.  You can also use ice cubes from your freezer and skip this step.
  2. When the water is frozen, remove the ice from the cup or tray.
  3. Put the ice in the glass or bowl of water. The cube will bob up and down in the water and then float on the top.
  4. Place one end of the string from the fishing pole on top of the ice cube and sprinkle salt on the ice where the string is touching. Watch as the water melts slightly and refreezes.
  5. After about 10 seconds, carefully lift the ice cube out of the water with the fishing pole. You caught a fish (ice)!
My results:
Salt - The string stuck really well to the ice and pulled the ice cubes up out of the water
Sugar - The string didn’t stick to the ice cubes and none of them were pulled up out of the water.  Some people started to see the ice cubes stick - but it then failed after that.
Flour - THe ice didn’t stick to the string at all 
Pepper - The ice didn’t stick to the string at all 
More salt than normal - The ice still got picked up by the string

Changing the variables
Don’t wet the string before hand 
Use only a little salt
Using lots of salt 
Try to catch the ice using sugar instead of salt 
Try to catch the ice using pepper instead of salt
Try to catch the ice using flour instead of salt
Change the time period that you wait before trying to pick up the string.


Explanation - Why does it work?
When salt goes over ice it melts.  In the ice fishing experiment, the ice melts a little bit and then refreezes.  The string gets frozen to the pieces of ice to make it stick on because of the water around it.
Resources:









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Monday, December 2, 2019

Catch it narrative

Yawn  I stretch my muscles up and down until they click.  I head outside to get a bit of fresh air... ah so nice and refreshing.  Now my friends start to stir and get up.  We lovingly look at the pomegranate that we grew.  However, our pride and joy that we feel suddenly turn to horror when We see a shadow circling...


We bolt back into our burrow trying not to be seen.  Out of the corner of my eye, I see a vulture inspecting the area for any food like a lion in stalking its prey.  I think he spots the pomegranate that we grew. He lands on the tree and nicks the plump and round, red and juicy fruit.

my friends and I declare war on the large, ugly vulture.  I raise my hand and everyone follows. My clumsy friend forgets to raise his hand and he goes off track.  We run as a pack towards the bird, like an army charging. I jump on his claw trying to rip the pomegranate out.  The vulture shakes his claw and I slip away.  I ponder to myself wondering what to do but then my gang starts to act.  One jumps on and then followed by everyone else to make one big chain from the birds claw to the ground.


 The vulture flies up and tries to shake everyone off and he is successful but the pomegranate comes off with us. Max throws the pomegranate to me and the vulture dives like a bullet out of a gun straight at me with pace. I quickly throw it to Max and we fool the vulture.  But Max drops the pomegranate and the bird retrieves it.

The vulture thinks its fine sailing from here so he looks back in happiness.  He lifts his head back up and to his surprise, he hits a rock face and lets go of the pomegranate, down a natural ramp and up into the air for me to catch.  We pass it along a line of meerkats until it gets to Max and he kicks it through two trees that look like a rugby post.

Splat
The pomegranate bursts open and our faces´ droop and go dark.  I burst into tears, our beloved pomegranate that we had successfully grown was no more.
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Sunday, December 1, 2019

purifying water

Water Filter Experiment 
Aim/ Purpose - 
To filter or clean water using a number of materials 
How to clean/filter water - making it clean
Materials -
Sand, 
gravel, 
activated charcoal, 
cotton wool, 
plastic bottles cut in half,
bucket of dirty water (can make the water dirty with soil or whatever from outside)

Predictions - What is going to work best?  What steps/process and in what order - why?
Cotton wool at the bottom - It will absorb the smaller dirt particles from the dirty water
2nd layer up - gravel - The gravel will grab onto the dirty parts and the clean water will drip off the gravel through the gaps.
Second Layer Up  - Charcoal - Second smallest material, can absorb the things not cleared by the bigger materials.
Third Layer Up - Sand - Turns hard when it’s wet - Take all the bigger dirt particles 
Top layer - Gravel - All the hugest dirt particles out first.  

Method/Steps:
First, you put cotton wool at the bottom
Then you put a sprinkle of fine charcoal
Now you put sand 
And finally, you put gravel at the top
Explanation - How did it work?
The gravel takes all the large pieces out of the water
Then the sand to take and pieces that have passed the gravel and the sand hardens.
The charcoal absorbs tiny particles of dirt and other things
The cotton wool holds everything from falling through
Why is it important for cities/towns etc to purify and clean the water before it gets to peoples’ homes?
In New Zealand cities and towns, clean water is pumped straight into our homes. We have systems in place to monitor how safe our water is for drinking, and to manage what happens. It also helps to stop illnesses and catches algae and bacteria.


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Boom in a Bag

Inquiry experiment  

Aim/Purpose : 
To see what happens when baking soda and vinegar mix/combine 
To see the reaction that occurs when these two substances are mixed

Prediction - What do we think is going to happen:
We think it will explode/ It’s going to blow up
The ziplock bag will pop open and the liquid will spill out
It could fizz up 
The bag might fill up with air 
Fizz up like soda when shaken
The air pressure created inside the bag will cause the seal on the bag to pop open

Steps:     
  1.  Open up a paper towel on a flat surface
  2. Put 4 levelled teaspoons of baking soda in the centre of the paper towel
  3. Wrap up the baking soda in the paper towel like a package - Keep the baking soda concentrated in the middle of the paper towel
  4. Tape down your package of baking soda with a piece of masking tape so that everything stays in place
  5. Open the vinegar and pour it into a cup - until the cup is half full
  6. Then open a zip lock bag and pour the vinegar into it
  7. Hold the package inside the zip lock bag, making sure it doesn’t yet make contact with the vinegar - then zip up the bag - making sure that it is completely closed
  8. Let the package of baking soda drop into the vinegar and shake the bag up a little so that they start to mix
  9. Observe what happens
Materials/equipment:
  • Baking Soda  (4 x tablespoons) 
  • Vinegar (half a cup)
  • Ziplock sandwich bags 
  • Plastic spoon
  • Paper towel 
  • Masking tape
Roles within the group:
  1. Presenter - conducts the experiment 
  2. Assistant - collects all the materials 
  3. Videographer - takes a video of the experiment 
  4. Recorder - Record the result




After students have prepared they can present the experiment in front of the class who will be the audience. The videographer can record the experiment and the recording can be shared at a later stage.  

The Result - What did we see happen?
When you drop the baking soda in the vinegar a chemical reaction was caused.




Variables - How could we change the variables?
Predict what might happen if we change the variables
It would be quicker 
Experiment - Were our predictions accurate? 
With more vinegar, it was slower than we expected

Put 5 or more teaspoons of baking soda into the package - Bigger explosion/more powerful 
If there is too much baking soda and not enough vinegar, it may not work

Put more vinegar  - Bigger explosion/not pop  

Way less baking soda and wrapped in more paper towels - nothing - it would take a longer time to see a reaction 

Baking soda - With no package surrounding it - The reaction would happen instantly and uncontrollably 
Science - Why did it happen?  Here are some websites to look at…. You may be able to find other websites too!
The first reaction is the acid-base reaction. When vinegar and baking soda are first mixed together, hydrogen ions in the vinegar react with the sodium and bicarbonate ions in the baking soda. ... The carbonic acid formed as a result of the first reaction immediately begins to decompose into water and carbon dioxide gas.

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