SCIENCE: EXPERIMENTING

We are learning to experiment with changing different variables.

Original
Materials:	Method:
-milk -food colouring -shallow dishes -detergent -eye-droppers or straws	1. Pour milk into a dish to a depth of about 1 centimetre. 2. Using an eye-dropper or straw, add a few drops of food colouring to the milk in different places. 3. Using a separate eye-dropper or straw, add a drop of detergent to the middle of the milk.

Today we followed the above experiment then made changes. We did the same experiment but with different types of milk. We all took turns and were all a part of the experiments. Each group created a recording chart on the computers to help them to make observational notes. We also timed how long each reaction lasted for.

We were puzzled by why different types of milk made different effects when mixed with dishwashing liquid and food colouring. We made comparisons and needed to answer these questions: 1. How did the results change? 2. What might the various results relate to?

Here are some of our thoughts so far:

Grace, Tommy, Aaliyah: The yellow top milk was very fast to react. The green top was the only one that had bubbles in it that went around the bowl and swirled around together. The amount of fat in full fat milk and cream caused the reaction to take time and the colours did not fully mix.

Emma, Azi, Fritha, Willow: The fat content in the different types of milk made changes in the speed of the chemical reaction. For example cream had 32grams of total fat per 100g in it which made it very slow with less of a reaction. The mix of the colours when experimenting with the fattest milk types were not as combined and in some the main colour stayed white.

Anna and Regan: The results changed by the fact that the higher the fat level, the slower everything moved. Also, the fatter the milk was, the longer it took to complete the full chemical reaction.

Zoe and Heather: The different milks all had their own reactions. Most of them started out very fast, then swirled and slowed down at the end. There was quite a range in time difference, from 1 minute and 5 seconds to 1minute and 45 seconds.

Blog post written by Danielle and Miss Campbell