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Marvellous Materials – Puddle Observation
Objectives
To explore puddles and observe changes.
Resources
Wellies | Water | Chalk | Strips of paper, string or ribbon for measuring the puddles | Clipboard | Paper and pencils | Recording Device | Assignment 8
Vocabulary
water | puddle | evaporation | bigger | smaller | drying up | materials | properties
Today's Lesson
Assignment
This lesson works towards Assignment 8. Please access the assignment for details about what you will need to submit to your student's Wolsey Hall tutor.
What to Get Ready
Ahead of the session, locate some puddles outside or recreate some by pouring water on the ground.
Main Activity
Ask your student to go back outside to look at puddles. Again, recreate puddles if there are no naturally occurring ones, and if you live in a hot climate, create the puddles there and then with your student.
Tell your student that together with you, they are going to measure the changing size of a puddle over the day (or overnight, or over a few minutes, depending on how your weather affects the rate of evaporation).
Practical
Give your student a clipboard, paper and pencil. Ask them to look carefully at a puddle and think about how we could measure it. Your student may want to measure the circumference or width by using the length of their foot or hand, for example. Or they may say they want to use a piece of string.
Go back outside regularly during the day (or first thing the next morning) to do the same measuring exercise and record it on the clipboard.
Before each trip outside, ask your student to think about what they might find.
Near the end of this experiment, film your student talking about what has happened so far, and carrying out one of their final measurements for submission as Assignment 8. During this recording please ask your student the following questions:
- Describe the changes you have noticed in the puddle?
- Why do you think these changes have happened?
- Would you see the same changes on a hotter or colder day? Why?
- Would you see the same changes if the puddle was on a different material? For example; sand, grass, concrete, or mud. Why?