Race cars and chocolates

What do race cars and chocolates have in common?  Both can be lessons that combine math and science standards that are necessary for our students to learn!

This morning, we started our science lesson with making a quick picture walk of a science model book.  Our professor provided supplies from FOSS that would be necessary to make race cars.  Since every person had the same book, we were required to make at least one modification to the race cars that were presented in the manual so that we can see some differences in the speed of the cars.

This was the very first model of our car.  We then realized that the larger, cardboard box wheels didn't roll very well.

We took off the wheels and added some weight on the car.  By the way, the car is called Valana - a mixture of Valerie and Bryana.  Extremely original, I know!

Here's the race:

I am content to say that Bryana and I won first place!! :)

Here is how we won:  I am extremely sorry for the horrific video footage.

Did you see it?  Did you see it go so far, that it went down the gutter?  Thankfully the gutter was dry!!

Chemical Reactions!!

Chemical reactions!  Exothermic?  Endothermic?

In science today, we created a chemical reaction mixing sodium bicarbonate (baking soda) and calcium chloride with water or phenol red.

CaCl2 + 2 NaHCO3 → 2 NaCl + CaCO3 + H2O + CO2(g)

That is the balanced equation of the chemical reaction that took place.

Here are some observable changes that occurred when we mixed the calcium chloride and sodium bicarbonate:

• change in temperature (increase)
• change in color
• change in state

We tested the items separately to see what was creating the change in temperature and recorded our responses:

• calcium chloride + water
• calcium chloride + phenol red
• sodium bicarbonate + water
• sodium bicarbonate + phenol red

We realized that calcium chloride mixed with a liquid has an exothermic reaction, heating up the product and that sodium bicarbonate with a liquid actually cools down, also creating an exothermic reaction.

Taking it a little further, we were looking at the effect of adding carbon dioxide to the mixture - will that cause a change?  Blowing with a straw into the mixed chemicals, we realized that it also created a chemical reaction - the solution heated up.

It was a lot of fun!  And a wonderful idea to share with the students!! :) 

Tropical Rain Forest Animal

With the help of artistic block 3, we're trying to create a tropical rain forest mural in EC-64.  Each student is responsible for drawing/painting one (or a portion of one) tropical rain forest animal or insect, representing all the different layers of the forest. 

I adopted the leaf-cutter ant.  There it is, very hard at work, cutting leaves, helping in the mutual relationship with fungi in the rain forest.  I will soon be learning more about them and will definitely share my findings!

For the mural, I have painted three ants.  They are a little bit bigger than its actual size.  I will post pictures of the ants, as well as the mural once it is completed!  In the mean time, here are some other images of leafcutter ants as well as videos offered by National Geographics.

Field Day at the Aboretum

Task: To find plant species, temperatures, and describe the environment in the Desert, the Woodland, and Tropical Rain Forest.  All of this, done at the CSU, Fullerton Arboretum.

What an adventure! It was my first time at the Aboretum and my-oh-my! there are a lot of really interesting plants there!  We observed some of the plants in the region to see what kind of qualities they have.  Then we took the temperature of the soil at ground level, 1-inch deep, and 1 meter up.  Technically there would be greater differences in temperature if we were really in the different biomes, however, because we were in the same city, about 2-300 feet away from each of the ecosystems, there weren't too drastic of a difference.

We also looked around to see what kinds of animal life are present in each of the areas.  We realized that there were a lot more birds and bees in the Desert region than in the Woodlands, however spider webs were present everywhere.

Here are some pictures of what we saw. 

A fig tree that is specific to India and Pakistan

 Aloe Vera plants close to the desert

 Large leaves, typical of plants in the Tropical Rain Forest where they always try to catch some water or sunlight in order to survive.

You can also click here to see the powerpoint presentation of our morning in the arboretum.