Fun hands-on activities that
explore the science of Halloween
By Andy Allan the Science Wiz; Director of
Curriculum Development at Champions Science Adventures
Champions Science Adventures summer camps and clubs
has created experiments to answer all those tricky Halloween science
questions. Best of all, they can
be done at home using simple supplies found in your kitchen pantry! Below are
two, or visit
www.scienceadventures.com for more.
Candy
Chromatography
What you will need:
Bag of M&M’s
Coffee
Filter
Scissors
Clear
plastic cup
Water
Chromatography
is a way of separating chemicals that are combined together in a mixture. Look at the ingredients on the back of
the packet of M&M’s. How many yellow dyes are listed? Why are their 4
yellow dyes in the ingredients but only one yellow colored M&M?
In
chromatography the chemicals are dissolved and placed at the bottom of
something absorbent like a coffee filter.
As water is pulled through the coffee filter by capillary action the
different chemicals will separate out. Some chemicals will dissolve quickly and
will travel up the paper with the water while others will want to stick to the
paper and stay low. When looking at mixtures of dyes you will see color trails
for the different dyes used.
What to do:
Take
the coffer filter and cut it into rectangular strips about 1 inch wide and long
enough to reach from the bottom of your cup and fold over the rim.
Fill the cup with about ½ inch of water. Select a color of M&M. Dip the edge
of the M&M into the water for a few seconds. While it is still wet draw
colored line across one end of the filter paper about ¼ inch from the bottom.
Place the filter paper in the cup so that the bottom touched the water but the
colored line is above it. Fold the top end of the filter paper over the rim to
hold the filter in place or use a small piece of tape. Let it sit for a few
minutes and observe what happens. Repeat for other colors.
How
many of the M&M’s had yellow in their color? What you are seeing is the
different dyes that make up each candy’s color separating out on the filter
paper. Rarely are pigments of any kind pure color they are usually mixtures of
pigments designed to give the right hue.
Try
this experiment with Skittles!
Spooky Ghost Cup
What you will need:
1 Paper 3.5oz Dixie cup
1 White
plastic bag or white cloth
1 Small
Toy Metal Spring
2 ft of
kitchen string
Whether you are being told to clean
your room or crinkling a candy wrapper, sound is caused by vibrations. If you
place two fingers on either side of your throat as you talk you can feel your
vocal cords vibrating. Twang a ruler on a desk or pluck a rubber band, whenever
something is made to vibrate it pushes and pulls on the air around it creating
sound waves that travel to our ears. With just a few vibrations and a little
science you can create your very own spooky Halloween sound effect.
What to do:
· Take the spring and tie the string
to one end of it.
· Allow the spring to dangle freely
by holding the string.
· Bump the spring against the side
of a table. What do you hear?
You did not hear much because the spring’s wire is so thin
and does not move very much air creating sound our ears can pick up. What you need to do is get the sound
directly from the spring to your ear and not use the air.
· Bang the spring again, but this
time hold the end of the string against your ear. What did you hear?
Spooky, isn’t it!
Now the vibrations travel up the string directly to your ear so the
sound is a lot louder.
Now that you know the spring can make a cool sound, it’s
time to make an amplifier so everyone can hear it. · Remove the string.
· Then take the cup and poke a hole
in the middle of the paper cup's bottom using a pencil.
· Hold the cup upside down and
carefully feed the end of the spring up into the cup. The goal is to get the
tip of the spring through the hole in the bottom of the cup. You may need to
bend the tip of the spring to make this easier. When the tip pokes through the
hole feed about ½ inch of spring through the hole and tape it flat to the
bottom of the cup.
· Shake the cup. What do you hear?
Now when the spring vibrates, the vibrations are
transmitted to the cup. The whole cup vibrates and moves a lot more air than
just the spring so the sound is louder.
To complete the spooky cup cover it with a white plastic
bag or a piece of white cloth. Add some ghost eyes and you have your very own
groaning ghoul to carry around with you on Halloween.
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