Minty Fresh

Minty Fresh

       I conducted a science experiment that was presented at Bishop Dunn's 6th science fair. I was also a judge at the fair and had to interview several of the students experiments. This was such an interesting experience for me. I used to have to do a science experiment each year in elementary school, but once I got to intermediate school I did not have to do them any more. As a child I remember loving and spending so much time creating a science experiment. I thought it was so much fun. Having to come up with an experiment for this year made me excited since I haven't done them since I was younger.

        The process of coming up with an experiment requires a lot of thinking. The first step to make an experiment is to come up with a question you want to solve. My question was, "does mint really cool down things?" I came up with this because I eat mints every other minute and it made me wonder. Then, I came up with a hypothesis which is an educated guess. I thought that mints did not actually cool things down, but I performed an experiment to find out for sure. While designing an experiment you want to be sure that there is a control, independent variable, dependent variable, and all the materials needed. You also want to be sure to record observations and data. The way I conducted my experiment was getting two cups of water of the same temperature and filling them up to the same height. I would record the temperature of both cups. Then, I would place 5 Mentos mints in only one of the cups of water. I only put the mints in one glass of water every time so that the other glass of water, with no mints, would be used as the control. Everyone knows water cools down from just sitting out; therefore, to determine if the water was just cooling because of sitting out or the mints I needed to only put mints in one cup. I would put 5 mints in the glass and record the temperature of both glasses of water for 25 minutes every 5 minutes. After observing my data, I noticed that the cup of water with the mints in it was a lower temperature than the water without the mints every time.  I came to the conclusion that mints actually does cool things down. Even though my hypothesis was not supported I am happy I did this experiment because now I know the answer to my problem.

          While being a judge during the science fair I got to witness so many creative interesting experiments. Students seemed to have so much fun while creating their experiments and could not wait to share what they did with me. Everyone's board was so nicely decorated and creative and the experiments were very well planned and thought out. As a teacher I would definitely incorporate science experiments into my class, because students solve a problem and learn the way things work and are the way they are for themselves. They also learn a lot from everyone sharing their experiments with each other. I also think it is important to allow students to pick out their own experiments to conduct instead of assigning them one because students will pick out something that interest and excited them. This will make the process of doing the experiment more fun and engaging cause students to learn more than if they were doing an experiment that they were not interested in.

These are some of the experiments that I judged.