Soil

Yesterday we had a look at our soil.

There are two different kinds of soil, tight and compacted or light and sand like!

To find out what ours was, we got some mud from the garden, put it into a jar and filled it with water.

Now, the less air bubbles that go to the top of the jar the more compacted the mud is.But if a lot of air bubbles go to the top it is light and sand like.

Our soil was tight and compacted, what is yours like?

PH Scale

Today I found out our soil's PH!

A PH scale ranges from 0-14 and the higher the PH the more acid is has and the lower the PH the more alkaline it has.

Our soil had a PH of 7 (neutral).

Science & Engineering Week - The Air Show at Sheffield Uni

http://www.scienceweeksy.org.uk/index.php 12th of March 2009

Daddy took me and friend F to a show at Sheffield University.
In the show they talked about all types of gasses and then they did experiments with them.
My favourite was when they made a fire ball, they got a candle on a stick and put it to a balloon filled with Nitrogen and it made a fire ball but it only lasted a few seconds.

My favourite experiment of the week was the egg in vinegar.
This is my last post about Science and Engineering week.

Potatoes Diary - 2

Today I set up a potato experiment.
I got a shoe box and put in bits of cardboard then Mummy cut a hole at the end of the box and put the potato the other end.
The roots of the potato will try and find the sunlight, so they should wind around the cardboard maze.


I will tell you what happen soon.

Science and Engineering Week - Resources

Science and Engineering Week - Engineering

This is my push chair I made.

Science and Engineering Week - Egg update.

Here is what happened to the egg, the vinegar breaks down the egg shell because the egg shell is made of calcium carbonate and the is vinegar is an acid!!!
The experiment took longer than it said it would, instead of 2 days it took 5 days.

Air coming out of the egg. The egg is porous, so lets the vinegar inside.
The egg was like a balloon , it felt like one and when we put a knife in it, it popped.

Thanks to Blue Yonder - Book of days January Issue for this experiment

http://blueyonder.typepad.com/

Science and Engineering Week - Day 2 - Surfaces.

Today's first experiment was called Manic Mixtures, what you do is get some milk that is room temperature and add some food colouring, then get a cocktail stick and dip it in to the washing up liquid.

Dip the cocktail stick into the middle of the milk.


The food colouring should then go to the side of the dish.
The food colouring goes to the side of the bowl because we broke the surface tension of the milk.

Science and Engineering Week - Day 2. Surfaces

The next one is with mushrooms.
The mushrooms we are using were dried out so we had to add water to rehydrate them.

The mushrooms expanded as they soaked up the water.

For this one you will need an egg and lots of clear vinegar.

Get a jar with a lid then put your egg in it, fill the jar with vinegar (the vinegar needs to be over the egg).

The experiment takes 24-36 hours so I will let you know what happens.

Science and Engineering Week - Day 1

This week is the start of Science and Engineering week ,so we are doing an experiment a day.
Today's first experiment was making a rainbow - you get a bowl and add some water then clear nail vanish,dip black paper in the water and you are meant to get a rainbow on the paper, but it did not work so we added some olive oil, but it still did not work.

The second experiment was called Sky and Sunset in a Jar, you put a drop of milk and some water in a jar or cup and then shine a torch on the jar, when you shine it on the back it goes red and if you shine it on the front it goes blue.

This one did not really work, we could see abit of red at the back but it should have been done in the dark.

We saved the best till last, Tornado in a Jar, here is how you do it - put a little water in a jar (with a lid) then add a teaspoon of washing - up liquid and a teaspoon of vinegar. Shake really well, then start move the jar with the lid on in a circle and you will begin to see a tornado forming.

Here is the link for events and information about this week.

http://www.britishscienceassociation.org/web/nsew/

Catch a Rainbow in a glass experiment

Get 4 cups and put in one 2 spoonfuls of sugar and the next one 3 then 4,5 and add 2 spoons of hot water to each.

Add a little bit of food colouring red,blue,yellow and green and mix well.

Each cup ready.

Then carefully put the one with 5 sugars in a cup then slowly sliding it off the edge of a teaspoon 4,3,2 and there you go, a rainbow.

Experiment taken from Blue Yonder Book of Days - March Issue.

http://blueyonder.typepad.com/