Supplies:
Aluminum foil
popsicle sticks
pennies or marbles
First, gather some objects to place in the boat. Pennies or marbles work well.
Fill your Aurora Innovator box about 3/4 full with water.
Using the Popsicle sticks and foil provided, and more of your own if you want, make a boat to see how many objects you can get to stay in the boat.
How many were you able to get in the boat without the boat sinking?
Try a different design. Did it work better?
When you stir or spin the water, a vortex is created in the center, similar to the vortex in tornadoes.
In a vortex, the water swirling on the outside has to move faster than the water on the inside to keep up.
This is why in a hurricane, strong winds are felt far away from the center but the center itself (eye) is calm.
Water tension experiment:
supplies:
plate of water
pepper
dish soap
Put water in a shallow bowl or plate.
Sprinkle pepper on top of the water.
Use your finger or tool, drop one drop of dish soap into the plate.
What happens to the pepper? Why?
This happens because the liquid dish soap changes the surface tension of water.
The surface tension of a liquid is the tendency of liquid surfaces to resist an external force due to the cohesive nature of its molecules. The pepper flakes are so light, it floats on the water surface due to surface tension. The addition of soap broke the surface tension of water, but the water molecules want to keep the surface tension intact. So they pull away from the soap along with the pepper flakes. This pushes the pepper or “germs” away from your soap covered finger. This is why soap is such a great cleaning agent and so effective in cleaning dishes and taking all the grease and dirt away.
This pepper and soap experiment also shows how germs are removed from hands with soap. The pepper flakes or “germs” were not chased away until you added soap to the bowl.
Color Morphing Experiment
Supplies:
Vegetable oil
Food Coloring
Glass or jar of water
Oil and water do not mix. They have very different densities. But putting them together can end in some cool results. First, fill your large vase halfway with water. In a measuring cup, mix 2 tablespoons of cooking oil with 3 drops of food coloring. Add that mixture to the water. Watch what happens when the water-based food coloring moves from the oil to the water. Try this with different color combinations.
Color Stacking
Supplies:
Straw
Sugar
Food Coloring
4 glasses with warm water
This one will seem complicated. Take your time. You may need to experiment with the ratio of sugar to water to make it work. .
Set up 4 clear cups. First, add sugar to them as follows:
Cup 1= no sugar Cup 2= 1 teaspoon Cup 3= 2 teaspoons Cup 4= 3 teaspoons Cup 5= 4 teaspoons
Next add 1 Cup of warm water to each cup. Stir to dissolve the sugar. Now, in each cup, add 2 drops of different colored food coloring. Feel free to add no color to one if you like. You now have 4 different color mixtures with different mixes of sugar in them. That means they will have different densities, too, and differing densities don’t mix well. You will now proceed to “stack” your colors and make a rainbow. Take your straw and cover the top with your finger. Dip the straw into Cup 1 and release the top of the straw. This will allow water into the straw. Cover the straw and again and life the straw out. You should have a small section of water from Cup 1 in the straw. Now dip the straw deeply into Cup 2 and quickly release and cover the straw. When you pull it out, the water from the first two cups should be separated. The challenge is now to proceed to rest of the cups, always moving from less dense to more. It may take some practice, and sometimes the colors end up mixing a bit. But your goal is to have a small rainbow in the bottom of your straw with your densest color at the bottom and the least dense at the top. How did it go? Did you mess up?
Here is another version of color stacking. Following the same directions for the first experiment, create 4 glasses of colored sugar water.
Now, take a tall clear glass or jar and gently pour some of the heaviest water (the one with the most sugar) into the glass first. Do the same with the other colors. Be sure to pour it in gently, maybe even down the inside of the glass so it doesn't mix into the other color. You can also try using a syringe or a turkey baster to put the water into the glass.
Which experiment worked best?
Color Stacking
Supplies:
Straw
Sugar
Food Coloring
4 glasses with warm water
This one will seem complicated. Take your time. You may need to experiment with the ratio of sugar to water to make it work. .
Set up 4 clear cups. First, add sugar to them as follows:
Cup 1= no sugar Cup 2= 1 teaspoon Cup 3= 2 teaspoons Cup 4= 3 teaspoons Cup 5= 4 teaspoons
Next add 1 Cup of warm water to each cup. Stir to dissolve the sugar. Now, in each cup, add 2 drops of different colored food coloring. Feel free to add no color to one if you like. You now have 4 different color mixtures with different mixes of sugar in them. That means they will have different densities, too, and differing densities don’t mix well. You will now proceed to “stack” your colors and make a rainbow. Take your straw and cover the top with your finger. Dip the straw into Cup 1 and release the top of the straw. This will allow water into the straw. Cover the straw and again and life the straw out. You should have a small section of water from Cup 1 in the straw. Now dip the straw deeply into Cup 2 and quickly release and cover the straw. When you pull it out, the water from the first two cups should be separated. The challenge is now to proceed to rest of the cups, always moving from less dense to more. It may take some practice, and sometimes the colors end up mixing a bit. But your goal is to have a small rainbow in the bottom of your straw with your densest color at the bottom and the least dense at the top. How did it go? Did you mess up?
Here is another version of color stacking. Following the same directions for the first experiment, create 4 glasses of colored sugar water.
Now, take a tall clear glass or jar and gently pour some of the heaviest water (the one with the most sugar) into the glass first. Do the same with the other colors. Be sure to pour it in gently, maybe even down the inside of the glass so it doesn't mix into the other color. You can also try using a syringe or a turkey baster to put the water into the glass.
Which experiment worked best?
Water Transfer
Supplies needed:
1 or 2 food coloring tablets
2 or 3 glasses or jars
1 or 2 paper towels
Start by filling one glass or jar with water and dissolving one food coloring tablet in the water.
Place an empty glass or jar (they should be the same height) next to the first. Fold and twist a paper towel width wise. Insert half of the paper towel into the container with water and the other half into the empty container.
Watch as the colored water begins to travel through the paper towel.
Soon, the water will have traveled all the way through the paper towel from one container to the other and it will begin to drip and fill the second container.
Now, what do you suppose would happen if you would try this experiment again, this time with three containers? Could you transfer the water from the first container to the second and then to the third?
What if you had 2 containers filled with water, each a different color (like yellow and blue) and an empty container in between them? What would happen?
Using more containers and different colors, how many containers and colors do you think you can do?
The water appears to defy gravity, but in reality, it moves because of a process called capillary action. Water is able to move against the force of gravity because water molecules stick to each other AND they stick to the fibers of the paper towel. As water molecules are attracted to the fibers of the paper towel, they pull other water molecules with them.
The adhesive forces between the water and the fibers of the paper towel are stronger than the cohesive forces between the water molecules. As a result, the water travels up and across the paper towel out of one glass and into another.
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Sink or Float
Supplies Needed
3 Cups
Salt
Sugar
Three eggs
Other adult approved objects to test and see if they will sink or float.
As you set this investigation up, make predictions as to what you think will happen and whether you think the eggs will float or sink in the water. To complete the investigation, first set up three cups, half filled with water. Dissolve two tablespoons of salt in Cup 1 and two tablespoons of sugar in Cup 2. Leave Cup 3 alone. Predict whether an egg will float or sink in each cup. Cup 3 is your control, meaning you haven’t made any changes to the water. The variable- or the change is the substance you’ve dissolved in the other two cups. Put the eggs in the cups. Do salt and sugar change things?
Now remove the eggs and try the test on other objects. So they sink or float?
