Pennies and Science

I love Homeschool Creations!! I'm sure many have been over there and learned a lot from Jolanthe. Honestly I'm more of a stalker at her blog than anything else.... but I can't pass up reading about the fun things that she does, and all her ideas that she freely posts and the worksheets that you are able to download. Anyway.... she has posted some fun easy science projects and here is one that we did.

We gathered up all the dirty pennies that we around the house... and surprise, surprise Tommy knew where most of them where.... probably because he hid them there :)

And then we gathered all the things we would need.

Vinegar

Salt

Water

Dirty Pennies

Cups or Bowls

Paper Towels

Tablespoons

Spoons

We made some predictions. We did things a little different than Homeschool Creations. We made predictions about what would make the pennies the cleanest. Would it be just plain water? Or maybe just salt. How about salt and water... or water and vinegar. We made predictions about each combination.

Then we tried them all and laid them out to dry. We found that a combinations on salt and vinegar resulted in the cleanest pennies.

Here is the reason....Pennies become dull looking because the oxygen atoms in the air combine with the copper atoms on the pennies. When we mixed the salt with the vinegar, a chemical reaction took place. Together the two different items formed a new chemical called hydrochloric acid. When hydrochloric acid meets oxygen atoms on the surface of the pennies, it makes them shiny and looking new.

After that we counted all the pennies and made sure the boys had the same amount and they got to put them in their piggy bank.