Partners in Inquiry Resources and Research
A partner of the Northwest Ohio Center of Excellence in Science and Mathematics Education. Funding provided by the Ohio Board of Regents.
Note to Educators: The activity below was created for facilitation after the Is It Matter assessment probe and prior to the Imagination Station traveling program. It can, however, be used anytime during States of Matter instruction.
T: We just completed the probe “Is it Matter?”
We know by definition that matter is anything that has mass and takes up space.
• How can we test whether or not something is matter? We could weigh it. We could measure it. But what if we don’t have the right instruments in our classroom to be able to test our guesses?
T: Is air matter? Let’s use this bag to see if air takes up space.
• Bernoulli Bag or Diaper Genie bag
1) Tie one end of the bag and ask one student to blow into it several times.
Ask students: What is inside the bag? Maybe students will think that breath is different from air.
2) Run around the room with one end of the bag open and see what happens when we close both ends of the bag trapping what’s inside. It looks like there is something inside.
Ask students: What is that something?
T: Air is inside the bag. Air is a gas. It is actually a mixture of gases including nitrogen and oxygen with traces of water vapor, carbon dioxide, argon, and various other components.
Air is matter .
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Partners in Inquiry Resources and Research
A partner of the Northwest Ohio Center of Excellence in Science and Mathematics Education. Funding provided by the Ohio Board of Regents.
Now let’s have you try an experiment.
Per group of four
• 4 pairs of Safety goggles
• One baby bottle
• One nipple without a hole in it
• One packet of Alka-Seltzer® tablets
• Water
• Measuring cups
1. Pour about ½ cup of water into the baby bottle.
2. Open the Alka-Seltzer tablets and drop both of them into the bottle
3. Now quickly screw the cap with the nipple on it onto the bottle, hold onto the bottle and watch what happens.
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A) Have students record their observations. You may prompt them with specific questions such as, “What do you see happening inside the baby bottle to the Alka-Seltzer and water?
What is happening to the nipple on the baby bottle?”.
B) After five minutes, ask the groups to report their findings and see if they can answer the question - What is inside the nipple that made it expand?
When you plopped the tablet into the water, the solid citric acid and the baking soda in the tablet react with one another – this is a chemical reaction that you see as the fizz. That fizz is carbon dioxide gas.
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Partners in Inquiry Resources and Research
A partner of the Northwest Ohio Center of Excellence in Science and Mathematics Education. Funding provided by the Ohio Board of Regents.
The main ingredients of Alka-Seltzer tablets are aspirin, citric acid, and sodium bicarbonate
(NaHCO3). When sodium bicarbonate dissolves in water, it dissociates (splits apart) into sodium (Na+) and bicarbonate (HCO3−) ions. The bicarbonate reacts with hydrogen ions
(H+) from the citric acid to form carbon dioxide and water. The reaction is described by the following chemical equation:
For a middle school level inquiry experiment with Alka-Seltzer® visit:
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This lesson allows students to measure the rate of the chemical reaction that occurs when
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Alka-Seltzer® tablets are plopped into water. They’ll track the volume of carbon dioxide gas produced at regular intervals after the reaction begins and investigate how changing the temperature of the water affects the production of carbon dioxide gas.
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K-2 “WATER AND ICE”
During this activity, children observe, measure, and describe water as it changes from solid to liquid and back again. Guiding questions are provided for teachers....also includes links to
“DISAPPEARING WATER” and “MELTING AND FREEZING” http://sciencenetlinks.com/lessons/water-1-water-and-ice/
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Partners in Inquiry Resources and Research
A partner of the Northwest Ohio Center of Excellence in Science and Mathematics Education. Funding provided by the Ohio Board of Regents.
3-5 “SOLIDS AND LIQUIDS”
This content resource is an interactive Flash animation that allows students to explore the behavior of solids and liquids when heat is added or removed. Students add heat to several common solids (e.g. chocolate, candle wax, butter), test the substance, and then cool it to return it to the solid phase. The animation displays the temperature at which the substance melts, illustrating that different substances melt at different temperatures. A quiz is included. Not a complete lesson.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/schools/scienceclips/ages/9_10/changing_state.shtml
6-8 “A MATTER OF STATE”
Using this resource, students understand that particle movement changes as a substance changes from one phase to another phase. http://sciencenetlinks.com/lessons/a-matter-of-state/
States of Matter particle differences http://www.chem.purdue.edu/gchelp/atoms/states.html
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