Final Post of my 2 weeks in review...

It was another blogging marathon but not as long as before. This time I managed to blog after only 2 weeks instead of a month. So here is my last post of my 2 week review. Scroll down and you will be able to catch up on our antics for the last 2 weeks......
March 3, 2009 Marshmallow Molecules
My boys are using the science series "Real Science 4 Kids". It is a great introduction to the sciences and a great review for my older girls before jumping back into high school science. We are in Chemistry right now but will complete both Biology and Physics before the end of the summer. They are 10 chapters each and can easily be done one chapter per week.
Because of various other studies we simply did the chapter reading over the last few months. So, we are now taking the time to do all the experiments. We have had nothing but science this week as we gear up for our Spring Break.
Tuesday we studied molecules. We first started by making molecules out of Marshmallows with no rules. Simply, put together some molecules using marshamallows for atoms. I discovered my children are very creative as you will note below.....

Needless to say, anyone who knows anything about Chemistry will recognize that only 1 of these models would actual work according to the laws of Chemistry. We wanted to show our kids that rules even apply to the natural world. Our Creator is a God of order not chaos. We then gave the rules for the number of bonds each atom could hold and had them build molecules with these "laws". They then understood how atoms combine to form different substances. This was a great way to grasp this concept and it was yummy too!

Here J and C discuss how it was much easier to make the molecules without the rules and how much more creative they could be. We discussed that creative did not necessarily bring forth function but we did all agree that it was fun.

A really enjoyed this as she is a very orderly and careful individual. Her molecules were put together very nicely.

Here is one of R's creations. He named it very aptly. He call this...."Chaos". LOL!

We are really enjoying our experiments this week. We have done chemical reactions with household items, learned about different forms of chemical reactions and will be working on acids, bases and determining ph today.

As a person with a science degree, I highly recommend this series for younger students. It really is Real Science 4 kids.