A whole class teaching tool created by

Paul Turner, Round Diamond School

Learning intentions:

To know what a fair test is.To interpret results.To write a conclusion. To know that results can be presented in different ways.

An investigation to see how the temperature of water affects how long it takes an ice cube to melt.

Apparatus

temperature sensor

container

water

stop watchRCX brick

ice cube

flask for keeping water at right temperature

Apparatus continued

Infrared transmitter for downloading programs and uploading data to and from brick.

Computer with Robolab software

coffee to keep Mr Turner going!

How did Mr Turner keep his test fair?

Used the same amount of water each time.

Used the same size ice cube.

Only changed the temperature of the water.

Tried to place ice cube in water after same amount of time.

Method

First of all I wrote a program using Robolab Investigtor to record temperatures every 5 seconds 100 times.

I then downloaded my program to the RCX brick.

You can just see the brick showing a temperature of 20.7 degrees C.

I put water from a flask into a container that was marked so that I used the same amount of water each time.

I then placed the temperature sensor in the water and started the program running. After about 20s I placed an ice cube in the water and started the stop watch.

When the ice had completed melted I stopped the stop watch and wrote down the time to the nearest second. I then stopped the program on the brick running. I then took the brick back to the computer to upload the data from the brick to the computer.

I repeated the experiment twice for different temperatures of water.

Temperature of water (degrees C)

Time taken for ice cube to melt (s)

63.7 100

42.8 135

27.5 295

Results

What do the results show? (Conclusion)

The greater the temperature of the water the quicker the ice cube melted.

Or

Conclusion

The lower the temperature of the water the longer it took the ice cube to melt.

Other ways of presenting results, using line graphs.

It took 100s for ice cube 1 to melt

It took 135s for ice cube 2 to melt

It took 295s for ice cube 3 to melt

ice cube 1

ice cube 2

ice cube 3

Combining all 3 graphs.

Drying sponge (a) Dinesh puts a wet sponge on some scales. He records its mass during the day.

50

40

30

20

10

00 1 2 3 4 5 6

Time (hours)

Mass ofsponge

(g)

Ice Cubes (a) Patrick used ice cubes to find the warmest classroom in school.

Forcemeter (a) Ellen and Michael investigated how four different objects stretched four identical elastic bands.

Which object was the heaviest?

Describe how the size of the force affects the length of the spring in the forcemeter.

Bird

Egg

Size of egg

Tim e takento hatch

robin blackb ird crow raven

20 16m m 29 21m m 43 30m m 50 33m m

13 days 14 days 19 days 20 days