Water Unit Part 3: Properties of Water

This unit includes 15 lessons of about 50 minutes and 25 page work bundle. The work bundle chronologically follows the entire set of interactive slideshows (hundreds and hundreds of amazing slides). Students record fill-in notes on the red slides, answer questions, conduct hands-on activities, collect data, and take assessments all in the work bundle. The slideshows are engaging and interactive throughout.

See a much larger Preview of this Unit including portions of the slideshow...

Water Unit Homework, Lesson Notes, Answer Key, Freebies -FREE

Lesson 1 - Structure of Water. Students learn about the water molecule, the basics of polarity, build a density column, and learn about volatility with a rubbing alcohol vs water. A series of simple and hands-on activities are addressed with exciting visuals and meaningful notes.

Lesson 2 -Polarity, Students use wax paper and a drop to learn more about polarity, and then instructions on how to build small lava lamps is provided. Students do need a 20oz soda bottle in advance, and teacher needs a supply of cooking oil and various food colorings. This can also be run as a demonstration if short of materials. this sets us up for the next days activity

Lesson 3 -Oil Spill at Sea Activity. This is a neat hands-on activity that has students try to clean up an oil spill. Teacher just needs some small trays filled with water, vegetable oil, eye droppers, string, cotton balls, some detergent, and paper cups. Students work for 30 minutes trying to remove all of the oil spill from an aquatic environment. They calculate cost and various techniques along the way. It's such a fun lesson.

Lesson 4-Adhesion and Cohesion. Students conduct an activity that has them try and put as many drops of water on a penny as possible as they learn about adhesion and cohesion. Another neat demonstration has the teacher slowly pour a cup full of water over students using a string. The water clings to the string and fills up the cup several feet away. A finally activity that uses a drop of water, smooth surface, and glass slide also helps to reinforce the learning as students place glass slide on the drop and then struggle to lift the glass slide off of the table. This lesson is full of fun activities.

Lesson 5 -Surface Tension. Student learn surface tension with several demonstrations and then conduct an activity called Swirly Milk that uses detergent, a plate, and milk. The students break the surface tension on the milk and the food coloring creates amazing colors.

Lesson 6 -High Specific Heat. Students continue to fill-out work bundle. An activity at the start of the lesson has student use an eye dropper to make on drop in a tray, and then two, three, etc. They then predict which will be frozen after 15 minutes. After 15 minutes teacher visit freezer and students see which are frozen, and then which melt first. This leads nicely into the lesson about high specific heat. Notes and image questions and learning about the Gulf Stream help complete the lesson.

Lesson 7 The Water Cycles (Two Days). Students learn all about the water cycle with fill-in notes, drawing diagrams, questions with answers, built-in quizzes, neat video links, and activities. Some of the activities include making water cycle in a bag to hang in the window, distilling water in a container, and filtering water with soda bottles, and covering plants with a bag to see transpiration. There's a lot in this lesson and it usually takes me two days if running the activities / demos.

Lesson 8 -Lake Turnover. This is a neat activity that students learn about lake turnover and then create summer stagnation using blue and red food coloring and water. The teacher usually aids in the process as the red water needs to be warm and cool water blue. If added together following the instructions in the slideshow the students get to see the warm epilimnion, purple thermocline, and blue hypolimnion. They then blow on the surface and add ice cubes for fall turnover.

Lesson 9 -Water Neutral pH. Acid and Bases. Students learn all about acids and bases with image based slides, questions, and activities. An activity cleans pennies with vinegar, another activity has students test the pH of common household liquids such as lemon juice, soda, milk, baking soda and water. The work bundle continues to chronologically follow the lesson.

Lesson 10 -Acid Rain. Student learn about acid rain and watch a video link. They get assigned a role and create an index card. They then place their card on a diagram slide that will describe the process of acid rain.

Lesson 11 - Water the Universal Solvent. Solubility. (Likely two days) Student's learn all about mixtures, take a built-in quiz, watch video links, and record notes. The lesson set's up the Soda Store Project Well.

Lesson 12 - Soda Store Project. Student's break up into roles and create a brand of soda. There's a president, graphic designer, taste chemist, and marketer. Together they use the info from the solubility lesson to bring in the ingredients (taste), color the soda, name it, design a logo, and presentation. I like to buy some carbonated 2 liter soda bottles, and use a funnel to add in the dry flavors and sugar for the students to create their soda. This is always a highlight project, with some hit or miss flavors. A class taste test concludes.

Lesson 13 - Properties Quiz and Wrap Up. A visual quiz and box game concludes the project. This lesson can be inserted at the end of the presentations from the soda store project.

Lesson 14 -PowerPoint Review Game. This is a 20 question assessment of the entire unit. Students fill-in the answers on their review game sheet on the last page of their work bundle. 5 for fun bonus questions, and final wager question conclude the game. This and all of the lessons can be run using google classroom / google slides if you wish.

Lesson 15 - Review Game Answers and Crossword. The answer version is provided so the teacher can go over the answers and the students can self-assess. The question is presented before the teacher can call upon students. A crossword puzzle is also provided which can run before the review game if you wish.

The Larger Bundle this unit is a part of is