1. to rise. The raisins should rise to

1. to rise. The raisins should rise to

1. Dancing Raisins Here’s another quick and easy science experiment.

All you need is a glass of clear soda, such as ginger ale or club soda, and several small raisins. Fill a glass with soda. Leave about ? inch (12. 5 mm) of space at the top. Drop the raisins in. Those tiny bubbles attaching themselves to the raisins are carbon dioxide (CO2) bubbles.

The irregular surface of the raisins enables a lot of CO2 to accumulate. When enough gas bubbles attach to the raisins, they act like tiny balloons, giving the fruit enough lift or buoyancy to rise. The raisins should rise to the top of the glass and float on the surface.As the carbon dioxide escapes into the atmosphere, though, the raisins will sink. Then the whole process will repeat itself time after time — so the raisins seem to dance. 2.

Growing Borax Crystals The project doesn’t require more than 24 hours to grow the borax crystals. Materials needed for this project would be a cup of water, string, wire, borax and food color. First of all, twist the wire into a shape (preferable, snowflake) suitable for growing borax crystals. Heat a cup of water in a jar. As the water starts boiling, heating should be stopped and the jar placed aside.Borax should be added to the water slowly, up to the point of saturation. In the mean time, the solution should be stirred continuously.

The wire should be attached to a string and inserted in the saturated solution. In about 24 hours, borax crystals grow on the wire shape. A piece of pencil or other suitable object should be attached to the other end of string. This object helps in holding the string while the wire is inserted in the solution.

3. Inflating the Balloon Take an un-inflated balloon and force the neck to open wide with the help of the middle and index fingers of both the hands.Ask someone to carefully drop in a few pieces of dry ice ensuring that it does not touch your fingers. Tie the balloon tightly and drop the balloon in a swimming pool. If you do not have a swimming pool close by, you can set the balloon aside or even drop it in a bucket, but the effects will not be as dramatic.

When the balloon is dropped in the swimming pool, it will sink. But as the pieces of dry ice begin to sublimate, the balloon will slowly be filled with carbon dioxide and will start rising to the surface where it will float. If the quantity of the dry ice that was put into the balloon was more, then the balloon may even explode.

. Magic Water This experiment can be used to teach young students the difference between alkaline and acidic liquids. In a glass containing water and ammonia, add some universal indicator solution.

The liquid in the glass will turn blue. Now add some pieces of dry ice. It will be seen that the solution gradually turns red.

Next, add some more ammonia to the container. The liquid will turn blue again. This is because ammonia is alkaline in nature while dry ice combines with water to produce an acidic solution. 5. Smoking Water Fountain This experiment can produce good visual effects.If you do not have access to a small water fountain around you, can use a small bucket or tub to produce the same effect. But you have to ensure that the water is warm.

So, if you are using a water fountain, you can carry out this experiment on a warm summer day when the water in the fountain is tepid, else you will need a bucket or a tub. To begin the experiment, you need to first pound the dry ice into small pieces. To do so, place the dry ice into a plastic packet and tie the packet up firmly.

Now pound the packet with the help of a hammer. Once the dry ice has broken down into small pieces, scatter a few pieces in the warm water.You will immediately see white smoke rising from the water. This is nothing but condensed carbon dioxide. The quantity of smoke will depend on how hot the water is and also on the quantity of dry ice put in the water. For constant smoke, you will need somebody to constantly replenish the dry ice in the water.

6. Make a Big Dry Ice Bubble We will need a large bowl or a cup with a lip around the top, water, A strip of material or cloth, Soapy mixture for making bubbles (water and some dishwashing liquid should do the trick) and Dry ice (Be careful with dry ice as it can cause skin damage if not used safely.Adults should handle dry ice with gloves and avoid directly breathing in the vapor). Place your dry ice in a cup and add some water (it should start looking like a spooky cauldron). Soak the material in your soapy mixture and run it around the lip of the cup before dragging it across the top of the cup to form a bubble layer over the dry ice. Stand back and watch your bubble grow! Dry ice is carbon dioxide (CO2) in its solid form.

At temperatures above -56. 4 °C (-69. 5 °F), dry ice changes directly from a solid to a gas, without ever being a liquid.This process is called sublimation. When dry ice is put in water it accelerates the sublimation process, creating clouds of fog that fill up your dry ice bubble until the pressure becomes too much and the bubble explodes, spilling fog over the edge of the bowl.

Dry ice is sometimes used as part of theater productions and performances to create a dense foggy effect. It is also used to preserve food, freeze lab samples and even to make ice cream! 7. Make a Tornado in a Bottle Take a clear plastic bottle with a cap (that won’t leak), water glitter and dish washing liquid.Fill the plastic bottle with water until it reaches around three quarters full.

Add a few drops of dish washing liquid. Sprinkle in a few pinches of glitter (this will make your tornado easier to see). Put the cap on tightly. Turn the bottle upside down and hold it by the neck.

Quickly spin the bottle in a circular motion for a few seconds, stop and look inside to see if you can see a mini tornado forming in the water. You might need to try it a few times before you get it working properly. Spinning the bottle in a circular motion creates a water vortex that looks like a mini tornado.The water is rapidly spinning around the center of the vortex due to centripetal force (an inward force directing an object or fluid such as water towards the center of its circular path). Vortexes found in nature include tornadoes, hurricanes and waterspouts (a tornado that forms over water).

8. Make Glowing Water You will need a black light (you can find them at places like Walmart and hardware stores, as well as online stores like Amazon), Tonic water or a highlighter pen, a dark room to do the experiment. If you are using a highlighter pen carefully break it open, remove the felt and soak it in a small amount of water for a few minutes.Find a dark room. Turn on the black light near your water, how does it look? Simple explanation: The ultra violet (UV) light coming from your black light lamp excites things called phosphors. Tonic water and the dye from highlighter pens contain phosphors that turn UV light (light we can’t see) into visible light (light we can see).

That’s why your water glows in the dark when you shine a black light on it. Black lights are used in forensic science, artistic performances, photography, authentication of banknotes and antiques, and in many other areas.Detailed explanation: Black light (also known as UV or ultra violet light) is a part of the electromagnetic spectrum. The electromagnetic spectrum also includes infrared, X-rays, visible light (what the human eye can see) and other types of electromagnetic radiation. A black light lamp such as the one you used emits a UV light that can illuminate objects and materials that contain phosphors. Phosphors are special substances that emit light (luminescence) when excited by radiation. Your water glowed under the black light because it contained phosphors.

If you used a highlighter pen then the UV light reacted with phosphors in the dye. If you used tonic water then the UV light reacted with phosphors in a chemical used in tonic water called quinine. There are different types of luminescence, they include fluorescence (used in this experiment, it glows only when the black light is on), phosphorescence (similar to fluorescence but with a glow that can last even after the black light is turned off), chemiluminescence (used to create glow sticks), bioluminescence (from living organisms) and many others.

9. Make Your Own Quick SandWe need 1 cup of maize cornflour, half a cup of water, a large plastic container and a spoon. This one is simple, just mix the cornflour and water thoroughly in the container to make your own instant quick sand. When showing other people how it works stir slowly and drip the quick sand to show it is a liquid.

Stirring it quickly will make it hard and allow you to punch or poke it quickly (this works better if you do it fast rather than hard). Remember that quick sand is messy, try to play with it outside and don’t forget to stir just before you use it.Always stir instant quicksand just before you use it! If you add just the right amount of water to cornflour it becomes very thick when you stir it quickly.

This happens because the cornflour grains are mixed up and can’t slide over each other due to the lack of water between them. Stirring slowly allows more water between the cornflour grains, letting them slide over each other much easier. Poking it quickly has the same effect, making the substance very hard.

If you poke it slowly it doesn’t mix up the mixture in the same way, leaving it runny.It works in much the same way as real quick sand. 10.

Gluep – Solid or Liquid For this experiment you will need 1 teaspoon (5 cm3) laundry borax, 1 tablespoon (15 mL) white glue (e. g. , Elmer’s Glue-All), food coloring (optional), two cups, spoon and water. In one of the cups, dissolve 1 teaspoon of laundry borax in 5 tablespoons (75 mL) of water. You will need to stir this for a while to get it to dissolve. (If a tiny bit does not dissolve, that is OK.

). In the other cup, combine 1 tablespoon of water and 1 tablespoon of white glue.If you wish, you may color the mixture with a couple drops of food coloring. With a clean spoon, stir the mixture thoroughly until it is uniform. Put 2 teaspoons of the borax solution from the first cup into the glue mixture in the second cup. Stir the mixture.

As you stir the mixture, it will stiffen into a soft lump. After the lump has formed, take it from the cup and knead it in your hand for a couple minutes. The material you have made is called Gluep, and it is ready for you to examine.

Roll the Gluep into a ball and then let it rest. Does the ball maintain its shape?Drop a Gluep ball onto a table top. What does the ball do? Flatten the Gluep into a thin strip. Hold up the strip by one end. What happens to the strip? Roll the Gluep into a cylinder and pull the ends slowly. What happens to the cylinder? Roll the Gluep into a cylinder and pull the ends quickly. What happens to the cylinder? The materials we call plastics are all composed of large molecules whose structure is like a chain.

These molecules are composed of many small repeating units, like the links in a chain. Like a chain, the molecules of a polymer are long and narrow.The name plastic is applied to a wide variety of substances, some of them soft and others very hard.

Originally, plastic referred to something shapeable or bendable. However, as new polymer materials were made that were hard and stiff, the name plastic was applied to them, too. White glue is a mixture of water with a polymer. The polymer molecules are shaped like very tiny pieces of spaghetti. The tangled molecules make glue thick and viscous rather than thin and runny. When glue is exposed to air, the water evaporates, leaving the tangled polymer molecules.

The tangled molecules stick to the surfaces on which they dried, and hold the surfaces together. Borax solution contains borate ions. These ions can form links between the long, thin polymer molecules in the glue, turning it into a 3-dimensional network. This network makes Gluep more like a solid than the plain liquid glue. The network holds its shape for a short time, and as long as it is not strained.

When Gluep rests, the flexible network gradually relaxes, and the Gluep flattens. When Gluep is stretched quickly, the links between molecules break, and the Gluep snaps apart into pieces.The polymer molecules in white glue are called polyvinyl acetate. These molecules are composed of long chains of carbon atoms, with an acetate group attached to every other one. Acetate comes from acetic acid, the compound that gives vinegar its odor and flavor. This is why white glue smells a bit like vinegar. When borax is mixed with white glue, each borax ion replaces two acetate groups, forming a borate link between two polymer molecules.

Gluep contains a lot of water trapped in the network of linked polymer molecules. This water contributes to the liquid-like properties to Gluep.If the Gluep is left exposed to open air, the water will evaporate, and the Gluep will gradually stiffen. To preserve the Gluep, store it in an air-tight plastic bag. A material similar to Gluep can be made using a gel glue in place of white glue.

Fluid gel glue contains polyvinyl alcohol in place of polyvinyl acetate. Borate ions form links between these molecules, too. In this case, the alcohol groups are displaced, forming water. 11. Lava Lamp •You will need water, a clear plastic bottle, vegetable oil, food coloring and Alka-Seltzer (or other tablets that fizz).

Pour water into the plastic bottle until it is around one quarter full (you might want to use a funnel when filling the bottle so you don’t spill anything). 1. Pour in vegetable oil until the bottle is nearly full.

Wait until the oil and water have separated. Add around a dozen drops of food coloring to the bottle (choose any color you like). Watch as the food coloring falls through the oil and mixes with the water. Cut an Alka-Seltzer tablet into smaller pieces (around 5 or 6) and drop one of them into the bottle, things should start getting a little crazy, just like a real lava lamp!When the bubbling stops, add another piece of Alka-Seltzer and enjoy the show! 2. If you’ve tried our oil and water experiment you’ll know that the two don’t mix very well.

The oil and water you added to the bottle separate from each other, with oil on top because it has a lower density than water. The food coloring falls through the oil and mixes with the water at the bottom. The piece of Alka-Seltzer tablet you drop in after releases small bubbles of carbon dioxide gas that rise to the top and take some of the colored water along for the ride.The gas escapes when it reaches the top and the colored water falls back down. The reason Alka-Seltzer fizzes in such a way is because it contains citric acid and baking soda (sodium bicarbonate), the two react with water to form sodium citrate and carbon dioxide gas (those are the bubbles that carry the colored water to the top of the bottle).

Adding more Alka-Seltzer to the bottle keeps the reaction going so you can enjoy your funky lava lamp for longer. If you want to show someone later you can simply screw on a bottle cap and add more Alka-Seltzer when you need to.When you’ve finished all your Alka-Seltzer, you can take the experiment a step further by tightly screwing on a bottle cap and tipping the bottle back and forth, what happens then? 12. Invisible Ink Many of you may have read about this one in the mystery novels for children. You can make invisible ink in two ways: Squeezing a couple of lemons into an empty bowl and mixing an equal amount of baking soda and water. If you have a spare ink pen, fill it with this newly created invisible ink. Alternatively, you can also use a cotton swab to serve the purpose of a pen.

Take a blank sheet of white paper.Using the ink pen (or the cotton swab dipped in the liquid solution) write a few words on the sheet of paper. Wait for a couple of minutes after which you should hold the paper over a low flame. You will see the invisible ink darkening and you will be able to read the secret message! 13. Make a Stethoscope You will need a balloon, a piece of tubing, 2 small funnels, scissors, a timer, rubber band (optional) and a calculator(optional). Take the piece of tubing and fit a funnel to each end.

Stretch the balloon by blowing it up and then letting the air out. Cut off the top third of the balloon with scissors.Stretch the top third of the balloon tightly over the open end of one the funnels. If necessary, use a rubber band to hold it in place.

Stir the mixture again with your fork and look at the long strands of gunk that have formed. As the mixture cools slowly add more water, small amounts at a time. To make it work: Find your heart with your hand by feeling where it beats in your chest. Sit down somewhere quiet and place the end of the funnel with the balloon over it against your chest, directly onto your skin, just to the left centre. Hold the other funnel to your ear. You should hear a low beating sound.Use the timer to count how many beats you hear in 20 seconds.

Multiply this number by three (use a calculator if you’re not confident) to find out how fast your heart beats in one minute. Try doing some more tests such as running around for 5 minutes and then checking how fast your heart is beating. Compare your results to your brothers, sisters, parents and even pets heart rates, are there any differences? What’s happening? Did you know that when a doctor listens to your heartbeat with a stethoscope, they are actually listening for two sounds? The first sound is a longer, lower pitched sound.

The second is a shorter, higher pitched sound.The lower pitched sound is made by the closing of two heart valves when blood is flowing out of the heart. The higher pitched sound is made by two other valves when blood is flowing into the heart. When a person exercises or participates in any kind of physical activity, the heart beats faster in order to pump more blood and oxygen to the muscles that are being used.

The closing of the heart valves makes a sound which causes the stretched balloon to vibrate. The vibrating balloon makes the air in the tube vibrate and the tube then carries these sound vibrations to your ear. 14. Warm Air Needs More RoomTake an empty bottle, a balloon and a pot of hot water (not boiling). Stretch the balloon over the mouth of the empty bottle. Put the bottle in the pot of hot water, let it stand for a few minutes and watch what happens. As the air inside the balloon heats up, it starts to expand.

The molecules begin to move faster and further apart from each other. This is what makes the balloon stretch. There is still the same amount of air inside the balloon and bottle; it has just expanded as it heats up.

Warm air therefore takes up more space than the same amount of cold air, it also weighs less than cold air occupying the same space.You might have seen this principle in action if you’ve flown in or watched a hot air balloon. 15. Use a Balloon to Amplify Sound Take a balloon and blow it up. Hold the balloon close to your ear while you tap lightly on the other side. Despite you only tapping lightly on the balloon your ears can hear the noise loudly. When you blew up the balloon you forced the air molecules inside the balloon closer to each other. Because the air molecules inside the balloon are closer together, they become a better conductor of sound waves than the ordinary air around you.