Saturday, May 17, 2014

Being a Scientist! Dancing Raisins Science Experiment

Science Experiments in the elementary classroom can be a daunting thing to plan and prepare. This one is super simple and great fun! We had some good fizzy fun with our first science experiment and introduction to our Being a Scientist unit! We dropped some raisins in Sprite and the magic of science excitement filled the room!



We talked about each step of the scientific method along the way using these cards. 

The kids felt like REAL scientists as they created a hypothesis, made observations and recorded along the way with a Raisin Experiment lab sheet.

Thankfully, it doesn't say Dancing Raisins at the top of the worksheet because that would be a spoiler! 

I wanted the kids to be totally surprised and they were!



Some students thought the raisin might explode. 
Others thought the pop might turn brown. 
One student was sure the teacher was going to shake the whole bottle of Sprite first and let it erupt everywhere! 
He must have seen that Diet Coke and Mentos experiment on an episode of MythBusters!


The kids were bursting with excitement as they saw our raisins begin to dance! 

We talked about how the carbonation in the pop is air. The bubbles attach to the rough surface of the raisin. When enough bubbles form, it makes the raisins bouyant and they rise to the top. At the surface, the bubbles pop and the raisins sink again.


This was also a great experiment for tying in some review of solids, liquids and gases.

We decided NOT to dump out the cups afterward, but instead will leave them all weekend and return to make more observations of the changes we see on Monday! 

I just love seeing the kids get so excited about activities like these!
:)


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