Melting Ice

Objectives:
*Measuring temperature
*Phases of water
*Hypothesis formation

Background:
J wanted to do science, and I have been a slacker the last few weeks/months. I wanted to see how well J did with reading a thermometer and making hypotheses (educated guesses), so I put together a melting ice science project on the fly. We even put it in J's Science Lab Notebook.

Methods and Materials:

Basically this project consists of  filling a clear glass full of ice and taking the temperature throughout the day as it melts.

Hypthesis formation:

I asked J, "What will happen to the ice?"
-He replied, "The ice will met to water."

I then asked, "How much water will be in the glass?"
-He stated, "To the top of the glass!"

Taking the measurements:

We set up the experiment and ran a few errands and took naps. I'm pretty sure we have a digital thermometer, but analog is more fun. J was able to tell what numbers the thermometer read (at least to the nearest 10).

10:35a: 20 deg F
11:00a: 30 deg F - ice is beginning to melt
1:00p: 32 deg F - ice is 1/2 way melted
3:00p: 60 deg F - ice is melted
5:45p: 70 deg F - water is now room temperature.

Note, the ice melted to water and the glass was half full (or half empty?). Volumetrically, ice takes up more space than water, which is why when you don't get free refills on your drink, you want less ice so you end up with more liquid.

J was pretty disappointed that he guessed wrong, but I told him that's ok. It's why we experiment, so we can learn more. Next time he'll know the answer. He was pretty excited for this impromptu science lesson.

Stay tuned for our colored ice cube experiment which we set up yesterday to do sometime soon.