Reactions of Metals
Level Assessed Task
The ‘Juicee Fruit’ company are launching a
new brand of orange juice drinks. They need
advice about which metal would be most suitable
to use as cans for their drinks.
Your task:
 The ‘Juicee Fruit’ company are trying to decide which metal to use for their
cans of fruit juice.
 You have been asked to write a speech for the scientific advisor, so she can
explain to the company which metal has been chosen for the cans and why.
The three metals that the company are considering are:
GOLD
ZINC
COPPER
You need to include answers to the following questions in the script for the speech:
- Which metal is the most suitable to use as a can for a fruit drink?
- What properties would you want the metal to have? (i.e. strong etc).
- Which metal is too expensive to be used as a can?
- Will any of the metals react with the acid in the fruit juice?
- What gas is produced when acids react with metals and how can we test for it?
Keywords: acid
Level
3
4
5
6
alkali
indicator
hazard
pH
neutralise
react
You should be able to…
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Describe some of the properties the metal would need to be
suitable.
State which metal is too expensive to use as a drinks can.
State which metal will react with the acid in the fruit juice.
State which gas is produced when metals react with acids.
Describe the test you could do to prove what gas is made.
Explain why only one of the metals reacts with the acid.
Explain why the same gas is always made when metals react with
acids.
Identify the most suitable metal for the fruit juice cans.
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Write a word equation for the reaction between a metal and an
acid.
Task B: Homo chemicalis.
There are about ten different elements found in the human body.
1. Collect a ‘Homo chemicalis’ sheet from the front.
2. Choose a different colour for each element.
3. For each element colour the number of squares shown in the table to show
how much of that element there is in the body.
4. Add the correct colour you have used for each element to the key.
5. Complete the questions at the bottom of the sheet.
Task C: Elements and Symbols.
Every element has a symbol. All the elements and their symbols are shown in
the Periodic Table.
1 – Collect a Periodic Table from the front.
2 – Write down the names of the elements you looked at earlier.
Find the symbol for each element in your list and write it down.
3 – Find as many elements that have symbols that are very different to the
name of the element, e.g. sodium, Na
4 – If you could give some of these elements new symbols what symbols would
you choose?