The American Chemical Society sponsors Family Mole Night at SUNY New Paltz every year. It's to celebrate National Chemistry Week, and the kids love it. Last year they used centrifigal force to extract the iron from breakfast cereal, watched a rose shatter after being frozen in liquid nitrogen, and changed a penny to gold (which we still have!) This year was no less cool.
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| Luke inspects his candy glass |
We started off with making candy glass, a fact that will now never be lost on my kids when we watch a movie with a window that gets broken. The kids got to measure the temperature as they stirred to get to the right temp and pick out colors for their 'glass'. In the same room, they got to make 'snow' and look at it under a microscope. It's what they use for artificial snow as it's light and fluffy, and what they use for diapers since it absorbs and absorbs and absorbs...
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| Luke's art made a mark! |
The next room was inks. They made ink with tea and ferrous sulfide. They called that Magic Ink, which prompted Luke to write 'Magic Ink', which impressed the people there so much we got called back so they could take a picture of it! How cool is that!? They also tested various liquids on cabbage-water soaked paper to see what reactions they got, since it reacts with acids and bases. They used windex, lemon juice, and a few other things.
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| Something cool is going on |
The last activity was Liquid Nitrogen Ice Cream. I, unfortunately, missed the demonstration, but Emily got her cup of milk with liquid nitrogen poured in and she stirred it until she had about the thickness of a milkshake. They even had toppings!
After a day of fitful school and various issues, it was so nice to have an evening of activities that the kids enjoyed, and that I felt encouraged them in a positive way towards science and education!
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