SG/Chem Blog 3

Over the last week in Sustainable Green Chemistry, we focused on Density, Mass, and volume. We started by doing POGILs (Process Oriented Guided Inquiry Learning) to learn basic concepts. After that we moved onto labs to learn about density mass and volume hands on. That's the short version, now let's jump straight into some chemistry.

Part 1: POGIL

To start our week off, we did 3 POGILS. Now, you might be asking yourself," What are POGILS?". POGILS are worksheets that teach by asking questions and providing a process to help you find the answer and teach yourself. I think that POGILS are great ways to learn, because it pushes students in the direction of being their own teacher. It helps people learn problem solving skills, and I think that it helps me remember the information, so I am prepared to do the labs.

*POGIL map*

The POGILS that we worked on mostly focused on data analysis, and understanding the relationships among mass, density, and volume. They did this by asking questions about the relationships between mass density and volume that we worked together in our groups to answer and learn.

Later in the week we did a lab that demonstrated these proprieties. Specifically we measured the mass and volume of steel, aluminium, and acrylic.

Part 2: Density, Mass, and Volume

To learn about density, mass, and volume we completed a lab to learn through experimentation.

Activity 1: Cubic Centimeters Vs. milliliters  

The first thing we did was establish the relationship between cubic centimeters and milliliters. To do this we made measurements of the width and length of an acrylic box, we then filled it with water up to a random point and measured the height of the water. Then we multiplied length by width to find the base, and we then multiplied the base times height to find out how many cubic centimeters of water there were. Finally we transferred the water into a graduated cylinder and measured the exact volume of the water. We then repeated the same process five times so that we would have multiple data points. In the end we discovered that one cubic centimeter is equal to one milliliter.

Activity 2: Density Study

The second activity was a study about density. We had rods of equal size made of steel, acrylic, and aluminium. We first measured the weight in grams of these rods and found that without exception the steel rods were the heaviest and the acrylic rods were the lightest with the aluminum rods falling somewhere in between. The next thing we did was fill a graduated cylinder with water. We then measured how much water was inside the cylinder. After we had taken a measurement, we placed one of the rods into the water and looked at how much water was displaced. The amount of water displaced was equal to the volume of the rod. While we didn't calculate the density, this experiment showed that density is related to the Mass of an object because, if an object is denser, it has more mass even if it has the same volume as another object.

Part 3: Conclusion

This week I learned:

• How density, mass and volume are related.
• How to test relationships between measurements of volume by looking at the relationship between 1 cubic centimeter and 1 milliliter.