Tuesday, February 5, 2013

Matter, Matters!!! We made Butter!!



We had a great week in Science.  As many of you know, I just started a 3rd grade position on Jan 2! Well, at our school we teach a nine week rotation of Science/Social Studies and then we switch to another homeroom and teach it again.  I can't wait to get  the whole way through 1 rotation.

I have the joy of teaching Physical Science, so we started this week with "What is Matter?"  I really wanted to get their attention right away. What a better way than with a Science experiment!!  Making butter!!! Showing a liquid to a solid.

Materials:
small glass jars with very tight lids-I used baby food jars!!
Heavy Whipping Cream
Lots of arm movement!!

I pour  heavy cream into the jars so they are halfway filled.  This is key, because you want to incorporate some air into the shaking process.  I have 4 groups of tables, each group got 1 jar and they shook it for about 1 minute and then I would have them switch.

10mins later (or so!!) We looked to see what was in each jar.....2 were whipped cream (less energy applied while shaking) 2 turned to butter (more energy applied while shaking) Kids loved this quick, easy and cheap experiment!!