Accel. Chem, Post 2

To start the week we did many demonstrations and smart board presentations on how particles move in solids, liquids, and gasses. The first demonstration we did was with the "Stinky Spray". For this we were all supposed to breath normal and when we smelt the scent, we were to raise our hand. The spray went towards the outsides first and then the middle, never quite hitting the back row of students. This showed us that the particles moved to fill up the room. This is called diffusion. We then watched the Hot and Cold water when food coloring was added to the water. The reaction is what most of us expected. The food coloring in the warm container spread out much faster then the dye in the cold water. This is because as temperature goes up, the diffusion ratio goes up. We then showed this on whiteboards by drawing particles with wooshies. The next day we watched 3 Eureka videos learning how particles react in solids, liquids, and gasses when they are heated up. We then took notes on these videos. Some notes that we took of each was the volume, shape, if it was compressible, and a microscopic explanation of each. We learned that a solid has a definite shape and volume, is not compressible, and the particles are held in a rigid lattice that are always in a vibrating motion. For liquids we learned that they have a definite shape, they take the shape of there container, are slightly compressible, and particles can move along and past each other yet always remain in contact with each other. If they are heated up and start to move faster, particles slide away and are then evaporated. With gases we learned there volume and shape take the shape of there container, are compressible, and that they move freely in all directions. One of the Eureka videos taught me why my soccer balls always become flat. It is due to the contraction of particles. This contraction happens because I leave my soccer balls in the garage, causing them to get cold. The last couple of days we have been working with air pressure and gas pressure. The experiments we did were with blowing the garbage bags with people on them, drinking our juice boxes, and the one where pat and Mr. G poured the Mercury in the tube. The experiment with blowing into the straws was the most fun of these. This showed us that the gas moves to fill up the space, so if a person is sitting on the container, it will fill around this area. It also showed us that the gas particles bouncing off the bag, raised the bag, keeping the person in the air.

 The Mercury one that Mr G showed us was showing us that there is gas pressure even in a container completely filled with Mercury. He tipped the tube upside down, leaving air in the tube. This showed us the Barometric Pressure of  the room.

 On Tuesday, we started a lab of volume vs pressure lab. We learned that Volume and Pressure are inverse of each other. As volume doubles, pressure nearly was halved.

Period 1 Accelerated Chemistry Blog 1

During the first full week of Chemistry we have been doing many labs to not only get to know our classmates, but also learn things at the same time. The first thing we did was get put into a random group by having different terms that were all related in some way. We then built boats in these groups. My group tried to keep our boat price very cheap. In doing this, we did not make a good spot to hold our pennies, causing our boat to sink. The next thing that we did was a mass and change lab. Here we did a series of 7 different tests. Each of these tests involved doing something with the original material and mixing, burning, or melting it. Taking the mass at the beginning and end. My favorite test in this lab was heating the steal wool over the Bunsen burner. I had  never used a Bunsen burner before so I thought it was cool. Here is a picture of Tyler standing by there Bunsen burner.

 

What we found with the masses was that most stayed the same. The only two experiments that had mass changes were the heating of steal wool and the Alka-Seltzer tablet in water. These had mass changes because they were chemical changes. The ones that had no change in mass were physical changes. This led us to our next lab named chemical and physical changes in matter. Here we did 5 different experiments that all had either a physical change, or a chemical change. The main difference between a physical and a chemical change is that you create a totally new product. Where as in a physical change you just you don't. The last thing we did was compare mL to cm^3. We did this by marking a line onto a container. We then measured the volume of the hen we measured how many mL of water filled to our line. mL to cm^3 were almost equal in our classes test. I did not know that this was true until Friday. That is everything we did this last week.