Experiments and Exploring with Mrs. Canevari's PIE 2-3 Class

Mrs. Canevari's class has been studying energy over the last few months by performing experiments with two parent volunteers, Mrs. Masefield and Mrs. Stevens. The parents, along with Mrs. Canevari, developed a series of lessons for the students to participate in. The first set of lessons focused on learning about types of energy and states of matter, and the second portion of lessons will illustrate for the children how energy moves through ecosystems. The kids started this session off by doing an experiment with snow.

A bucket of snow was brought into the classroom and the students discussed what makes snow melt and what makes it stay "snow or ice." They divided the snow into smaller portions and decided to experiment with different materials and temperatures to see what would make the snow melt.

The snow was placed inside plastic cups and then it was put into one of the following categories:
(a) control cup- they didn't do anything to the snow
(b) salt cup- they added salt to the snow
(c) bubble wrap cup- they wrapped it up in bubble wrap
(d) aluminum foil cup- they wrapped it up in foil
(e) lamp cup- cup of snow placed under a desk lamp
(f) window cup- cup of snow placed in the sunlight

Close-up view of 3 cups

The students made a hypothesis, a proposed explanation for what they thought would happen to the snow in the cups. Most students thought the snow in the cup with salt would melt the fastest, but several thought the snow in the cup under the lamp would melt quicker than the salted snow. They set up the experiment and then went outside to hike the nature trail so that the experiment would have time to work. 

To walk on the nature trail you have to take the Peace Path, you cross this bridge to get to it!

When you find "The Peace Path" sign you know you are going in the right direction

Here are the students! They are studying the environment together: looking at the buds on the trees, quietly looking and listening for birds and collecting specimen of nature that they find outside.

A twisty vine- it will go right into the specimen jar!

Walking a little further down the trail you come to a large pond where the kids look for wildlife. Mrs. Masefield collected a water specimen so that the class could measure the temperature of the pond water at this time of spring.

Towards of the end of the trail you come to the windmill. Mrs. Masefield explains how the windmill makes energy to the class. By the end of the hike the kids were excited to go back inside to see how the snow experiment turned out. 

Whoa- the snow has melted! But what cup of snow melted the most????

The winner, the cup under the lamp!!

Here are the cups in "melting" order: lamp cup, salt cup, bubble wrapped cup, foil wrapped cup, window cup and control cup.

I asked some students, "Why did you think that the salt would melt the snow?" They told me, "Well, whenever it snows my parents put salt on the driveway to help keep the snow from turning into ice, so I thought that the salt would melt the snow in the cup too." VERY SMART! Mrs. Masefield explained that perhaps the cup of snow with the salt would have melted faster if they had put more salt into it. But that experiment will have to wait for next time...

Dory Masefield has dual degrees in Physics & Chemistry and Kathy Stevens is a Chemist