Tuesday, March 26, 2013

Just Chillin' With My Peeps

With all the Easter candy out and about, we decided to conduct some observations on some seasonal treats: Peeps!



As any good scientist does, we hypothesized and made predictions about the task at hand: What would happen if we put a Peep in a beaker of 200 mL of water? What will happen if we put a Peep in 200 mL of vinegar?

Some ideas: Sugar dissolves, so the Peep will dissolve. Vinegar is acidic, so it will dissolve the Peep faster.

After letting the Peeps sit for an hour, we discovered only the sugar on the Peeps in water dissolved, but the marshmallow portion was still in tact. As for the vinegar, it was bubbling a little bit, but the sugar was dissolving at a much slower rate than the Peeps in water. Again, the marshmallow was still in tact!

Click the link to see a similar experiment, and possible explanation for why the Peeps didn't completely dissolve: http://www.peepresearch.org/solubility.html

Friday, March 15, 2013

A Garden for Florida

Fourth grade students participated in Garden Dedication Ceremonies on March 12, 2013.  Springwood is one of 500 schools across Florida to plant a native wildflower garden and to dedicate it to a special Floridian in celebration of Florida's 500th birthday. We chose to honor John Gorrie, a physician and an inventor who paved the way for the invention of air conditioning.  A biography writing contest was held and the top two essays were chosen to be read at the ceremonies held that day.  Students also wrote and shared original poetry, sang Happy 500th birthday to Florida, and planted our state's wildflower, Coreopsis.  WCTV news covered the event and we were featured on the evening news! 



Check us out on the news!

Tuesday, March 12, 2013

Egg Drop

Second and Third Grade STEM Members were finally able to complete their Egg Drop Experiment today. The club members put the finishing touches on their designs before loading up their eggs and taking them for a ride through the air! 


 Finalizing their designs
 Working hard
 Finishing touches!
 Isaac climbs up to the top.
 Michael climbs to the top.
Michael got stuck. A little STEM Club love and teamwork got him down!
 This egg didn't fair too well!
 3-2-1
 Logan's egg hits the ground. Do you think it survived?
Kai shows off his unharmed egg.