Learning Experience 1.1
The Salt and Pepper Pickle
Oh no! Your teacher has just mixed together the salt and pepper you need for
your next experiment and in their haste to clean it up they scraped it into a
beaker that had water in it!
How are the salt, pepper and water going to be separated so that your class
can complete the experiment?
TASK 1
Draw a diagram or flow chart to show how you could separate the salt,
pepper and water.
TASK 2
Write a method you could use to separate the salt, pepper and water
using the following equipment:
beakers
tripod
bunsen burner
filter funnels
filtration paper
electronic balance
salt
pepper
water
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Task 3
Try and separate a mixture of salt, pepper and water using the method
you have
just written.
Task 4
How well did your method work? Did you encounter any problems or
difficulties?
How could you have overcome these problems?
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Task 5
Follow this scientific method for separating salt, pepper and water and
compare it to
the method you designed yourself.
1)
Measure 20 grams of salt and 20 grams of pepper using the
electronic balance
2) Measure the mass of the filter paper
3) Measure the mass of the beaker
4) Mix the salt and pepper with 75ml of water
5) Filter the solution to remove the majority of the pepper from
the solution
6) Leave the filter paper to dry
7) Evaporate the water from the beaker
8) Weigh the beaker and the salt
9) Weigh the filter paper and the pepper
10) Find the mass of the salt and the pepper
How efficient was this process in recovering the salt and pepper?
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Where has the rest of the salt and pepper gone?
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Have you really separated all of the pepper and the salt? Are there
other ways we could find out?
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Does this method solve any of the problems you encountered with
your own method?
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What could you do if you needed to separate two liquids rather than
two solids?
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