User:YlmbWP/sandbox

Hello and Welcome to the Big Book of fun Science Experiments!

This book is about science experiments that you can do in the home and experiments that you can nag your teacher to do in school. These experiments are easy to do and help in understanding various things about science.

Contents

Featured Experiments

A drawing of green slime

• Slime recipes

Yucky gooey slime! Isn't it just great?! We love it!

A red cabbage growing in a field

• Red cabbage indicator
• Red cabbage indicators are great for showing if something is an acid or base. It's that exciting!

A drawing of a simple pinhole camera

• Pinhole Camera

Want to be able to see the sun and solar eclipses clearly without hurting your eyes? Then this is for you!

Watch those raisins dance in the soda water

        Raisin Dance

        Make those raisins dance. And the best bit is - after you finish your experiment, you can eat the raisins!

Other Experiments

Chemistry

• Acid Investigations - It is ACID! Isn't it cool?
• Baking Powder and Lemon Squash - A chemical reaction that you can drink; and you don't get chemical burns!
• How A Bath Fizzer Works, and How To Make One - Learn how that fizzer works, and make one with stuff you can get from your kitchen or a craft store. Children may enjoy making the salts in this chemistry experiment.
• Chromatography of inks
• Electricity from Lemons - Yep, those juices you put in your highly conductive drinking water have the potential to store electricity! Amazing!
• Fun with Baking Powder and Vinegar - Bombs and fire extinguishers on the same page? You can do both with these two.
• Explosive foam - Use magnesium and HCl to get really explosive soap bubbles
• Grow Your Own Crystals - Just what every kid needs: Your own crystals!
• Power a boat with soap - The best part is: it is a boat powered with ordinary soap!

Biology

• Grow Your Own Fungi - Don't have a garden? Never mind, you can create your own miniature one on a slice of bread.
• Guide a Termite - Make them obey your every command!
• Keep your mouse warm - Ever had those days where you get to your mouse and you find the worst thing ever; that your mouse is — A LITTLE CHILLY? Well avoid such day wreckers in the future with this fun experiment.
• Make a colorful flower - How to dye a white carnation flower pretty colors.

Physics

• Build your own periscope - WOW! It now takes even LESS energy to look around corners. What an age we live in!
• How to make a Needle float, and How to make it sink - Learn that a steel needle can float in fresh water, but cannot in soapy water.
• Make a floating compass - Who needs a store-bought compass when you can make your own?
• Make a spinning paper helicopter - You can make a helicopter out of paper! Does one need any other reason to do this experiment?
• Make a switch - Make a device to turn lights on and off.
• Making rainbows in liquids - Have the time and skill to remain still in order to see pretty colors in liquids? Then this is most certainly for you!
• Test floating - Always make sure things float BEFORE you use them as a life preserver!
• The fantastic squirting egg - Want to annoy other people by squirting them with eggs and not even put enough energy into it to crack an egg? Then this is for you!
• Oobleck - Make a substance that is both a liquid and a solid.
• How to Make an Electromagnet - Make a real electromagnet from stuff you probably have lying around the house!

Other

• Write secret messages - Do you fancy being a spy when you grow up?

Slime Recipes

Do you like making slime? We do, here are some simple experiments of how to make some:

• Place 2 tablespoons of PVA (polyvinyl acetate) glue in a zipper-type plastic bag and add an equal quantity of water.

• Add 1 or 2 drops of food colour, if you want.

• Add 1/2 teaspoon of saturated borax solution. (Borax can be bought in a pharmacy, or nag your science teacher to do this at school)

• Squeeze the bag to mix the contents

• When the slime has mostly formed, reach in and take out the slime. Don't be shy, it will not hurt you!

• Knead the slime to make it smooth.

• Puuuuuuurfect!!! You have made your slime! It should be a bit like putty.

Similar Experiments

Another type of slime you can make, using cornstarch and water, is Oobleck.

Red Cabbage Indicator

An acid and base indicator is a chemical that shows whether different chemicals are acids (like lemon juice) or bases (like baking powder). This is called a chemical's pH. You can make an indicator using red cabbage juice. The cabbage juice changes color depending on how acidic or basic (alkaline) the chemical is. The pH level is indicated by the amount of hydrogen (the "H" in "pH") ions in the tested chemical. Hydrogen ions are protons that had their electrons stripped off them (since hydrogen atoms consist of one proton and one electron).

We often use a test like this to make sure swimming pools are kept at the right pH. If the water in a swimming pool is too acidic or too basic (alkaline), it can damage pool equipment, bathing suits, or stop the chlorine that keeps pools clean from working properly.

pH is measured on a scale of 1 to 14. Neutral chemicals have a pH of 7. Acidic chemicals have a pH of 1-6. Basic (alkaline) chemicals have a pH of 8-14.

The Experiment

Safety

As with all experiments, you should always get help from an adult. Some acids and bases can hurt your skin, so you should wear:

• Rubber gloves
• An apron
• Safety glasses (regular glasses, sunglasses or swimming goggles are okay if you don't have safety glasses).

If you get chemicals on your hands or gloves, do not touch your eyes! Wash your hands after completing the experiment.

What You Need

• A red cabbage
• A knife or grater
• A medium sized bowl
• At least 4 small cups
• Chemicals to test such as lemon juice and baking powder or soda
• coffee filter

Step 1

• Have a parent, guardian, or teacher help you cut or grate between a quarter or a half of the cabbage into small pieces.
• Put the cabbage into a medium sized bowl.
• Pour water over the cabbage. You can use cold water, warm or boiling water. Boiling water will work the fastest, but only boil the water if you have an adult to help you.
• Let the cabbage sit in the water for a while (30-45 minutes), until the water turns a deep purple colour. You can stir the mixture to speed up the process.

Step 2

• Using a coffee filter or a fine sieve, strain the juice into a cup. It should be deep bluish purple in colour.
• Pour equal amounts of the strained liquid into small plastic cups. These are your 'test tubes' in which you will test different chemicals.

Step 3

• Set one of your cups ('test tubes') aside. This is your control. It already contains water, which usually has a pH of 7. This means that water is neither an acid nor a base.
• Assemble some testing chemicals (some good ones to try are below).
• Label each cup with the name of the test chemical each cup will contain, so you will remember what you put in each cup.
• Which chemical do you think is the most acidic?

Step 4

• Pour, drip or spoon a small quantity of each test chemical into the cup labeled with its name.
• Observe the change in colour of the juice. If the juice turns reddish, the chemical you are testing is an acid. If the water turns bluish, the chemical you are testing is a base. If it stays the same, the chemical is neutral, like water.

Some Chemicals to Test

• Lemon juice
• Baking powder or soda
• Milk
• Yogurt
• Vinegar
• Soap

Observations

• Arrange your cups from red, to pink, to violet, to purple, to blue, and to green. You might not have all of these colors, but that's okay.
• The cup that is most red is the most acidic. The cup that is the most blue or green is the most basic (alkaline). Which chemical is the most acidic? Which is the most basic (alkaline)?

Pinhole Camera

You will need these things:

• A Long Box (The longer the box the bigger the picture will be)
• A Pin or Needle
• Some Glue
• Some Tin Foil
• A Ruler
• A Pair of Scissors

How to Make the Pinhole Camera

Step 1: Cut a square hole in the top of the box on the smaller end that is about 1 inch by 1 inch (2.5 by 2.5 cm) (use your ruler!)

Step 2: Draw a line around the hole with some glue, then put a square on tinfoil on top so that the hole is covered.

Step 3: Once the glue is dried, poke a tiny hole in the tin foil with the pin.

Step 4: Cut a hole on the long side of the box so that you can see the bottom of the inside of the box.

How to Use the Pinhole Camera

Next time you know there is going to be a solar eclipse, point your pinhole camera towards the sun. The light will shine in through the pinhole and out onto the bottom of the box. Looking right at the sun can hurt your eyes, so using a Pinhole Camera is a fun and safe way to watch eclipses.

Raisin Dance

What you need to do

Step 1

Get a clear drinking glass (or beaker). Fill it with a bubbly and clear drink like Sprite.

Step 2

Get raisins and add them slowly and keep putting them in the beaker.

What Happens?

The raisins rise up to the top, then fall down, and then rise to the top again. It's like they're dancing.

The Science Bit

The bubbly drink that you used is packed full of a gas called Carbon Dioxide (CO₂). There's so much CO₂ that it bubbles out of the drink. That's what makes it fizzy.

When you drop the raisins in, some of the bubbles stick to the raisins. Since the bubbles are trying to rise up out of the drink, they pull the raisins along for the ride. Once a raisin gets to the top, the bubbles come out of the drink and pop. Since the raisin doesn't have bubbles holding it up anymore, it falls back down where the process starts all over again.

Don't forget to clean up! You can still eat the raisins and drink the soda.

Acid Investigations

These are the types of food and drink that contain acid:

Foods

• Lemons
• Oranges
• Grapes
• Grapefruits
• Tomatoes

Drinks

• Fruity drinks
• Fizzy drinks.

Experiment:

• First get a glass of milk.
• Then slice a lemon in half and squeeze one half until the drops of lemon juice come out.
• Have the glass of milk ready underneath.
• Then taste.
• Is there any difference?

Principle

The milk should taste considerably different because the small quantities of juice from the lemon have large quantities of Citric Acid. Citric Acid is common in many foods because it cheap and potent (meaning that it has a strong taste).

Acidity is a measurement of the activity of hydrogen atoms in a molecule. This is measured on something called a “pH” scale, where anything below a 7 is an acid, anything above a 7 is a base. When the acid and base mix, they create a reaction, which breaks bonds between the molecules of the acids and bases. In some cases, this reaction can produce heat (which is why many cartoons show acids as being able to burn through steel and other materials).

Baking Powder and Lemon Squash

1. Take out a clean shiny glass.
2. Add lemon, orange, or summer fruits squash and pour it in.
3. Take a pinch of baking powder.

If you use the summer fruits squash, which is pink, the frothy bubbles will be pink!!

Watch your amazing experiment bubble!

How a Bath Fizzer Works, and How To Make One

A bath fizzer or bath-bomb is a mixture of perfume or scent mixed an alkaline and an which reacts in water.

Ingredients

Look at the ingredients on baking powder: These usually just contain sodium bicarbonate which may be written as NaHCO₃ but may also contain lemon juice or citric acid (H₈O₇). These are the alkaline and acid you need. Citric acid is the main ingredient of fizzy lemon or orange drink crystals and bath salts. in Europe, citric acid is often listed as as E330, bicarb is E500.

Some pharmacists stock boxes of pure crystalline sodium bicarbonate and refined citric acid crystals, but these things are cheaper and more easily sourced simply by reading the labels on various powder products sold in ordinary shops. The wanted product should be the main (ideally only) ingredient, but expect to find colour, flavour and texture products mixed.

Experiment

The 'best' mixture will depend on the exact nature of the products you can find, but a good starting point is an equal mixture of both ingredients, which we call 1:1 ratio of 50%. You may have try different mixtures: 1:1, 1:2, 1:3, until the most lively reaction occurs, particularly with baking powder, which often contains rice flour.

Swirl the two dry powders together and then, with clean wet hands, squeeze them into a ball. The moisture on your hands will react with the outer layers, which will feel funny and form a sort of shell. Don't do this if you have cuts or grazes, because it can hurt. Once the ball has set, place it on a dry surface, wash your hands thoroughly and dry them. Getting just the right moisture to make the ball 'set' will require a bit of trial and error!

Now take some water that is as hot as is comfortable for a bath, drop the ball into it, and watch what happens!

Finally try adding some aromatic cooking powder such as dried lavender, vanilla or nutmeg. That's it!

Chromatography of Inks

Get some filter paper - use a coffee machine filter or ask your science teacher for some (say please, it isn't free) - water and pens. First you put pen marks on the filter paper then stand it upright in a beaker of water then all the colours will separate.

Depending on chemical properties of the components of the ink, some colors may travel further up the paper and some inks may separate so that individual components can be seen.