Floating and Sinking

Today the children (Marie-Kate, 4 and Alexis, 7) drew up a chart of things they thought would float and sink for this weeks unplugged "water" project. After finishing the list they filled up a bowl from the kitchen to see if they were right or not.

On their list they wrote a bottle top (in plastic), a marble, some plasticine, a plastic bottle, a glass bottle, an apple, a yogurt pot and some grains of rice.

They used a spot of paint either at the bottom on top of water to show which things they would float or sink.

They were right about the bottle top ( sorry, I forgot the photo, they did it too quickly!) it floated. Then they decided to sink it by putting water inside
and then by throwing it in the water.










Next up, they put the marble in the water, it sunk, they were certain it would, however, Alexis knew he could make it float, first he flattened some plasticine and made it into a bowl shape, this didn't float either with the marble in, but alone it did. He got the plastic yogurt pot and put the marble inside, it sank too. Finally it worked when he put a little water in the pot and gently placed it, with the marble inside in the water.








Both bottles floated, but they would sink if filled with water














Above is the finished chart, it's a bit messy as the paint smudged when Marie-Kate leant over it.

Later I'll add on what Gabrielle decided to do for her unplugged project.