Solubility, Capillary Action, Math, and Art

This week we had a combined art and science project, with a little math thrown in for good measure!

You need a white T-shirt, permanent markers, isopropyl alcohol (we used 70% though 90% would be fine too,) a dropper bottle (we used a non-medical syringe,) a large plastic cup, and a rubber band. Here you see the boys posing with their new T-shirts ready to start the project.


Slip the plastic cup inside the T-shirt so the opening of the cup faces towards the front panel of the shirt. On the outside of the shirt, pull the shirt tightly over the cup and put the rubber band around the top to secure it.

Put spots of various colors on the section of the shirt secured to the cup. You can put wavy lines, too, if you like the effect.

Here's the science part. Permanent markers are not soluble in water, but they are in alcohol. Fill your dropper bottle with the isopropyl alcohol and drop in onto the decorated section. Because the permanent marker is alcohol-soluble, the ink "runs." Capillary action moves the ink along the fabric.

Because the syringes are graduated, the boys made up math problems as they went along, like, "Mom, if I had 30 mm of alcohol to start and now I have 10 mm, how much did I use?"


Here are the boys with their finished projects.

We did have a PROBLEM though. I rinsed the shirts in water before washing them, but all the ink washed away. Next time I am going to rinse them well again, then run them through the dryer to evaporate off all the alcohol (it is very volatile, which is why it has such a strong odor) before washing it. The boys have been bugging me to get more shirts ever since.

One Lovely Blog Award

Thank you Sara in the Woods for this award posted on her blog The Forest Room. Just the graphic alone makes this a neat meme to pass along! I am a tea drinker; I have an entire cabinet filled with different varieties and accessories, with more loose teas in my ginger jars.

Here are the rules of this award:

Accept the award, post it on your blog together with the name of the person who has granted the award, and his or her blog link.

Pass the award to up to 15 other blogs that you’ve newly discovered. Remember to contact the bloggers to let them know they have been chosen for this award.

1. This needs to go back to Sara and The Forest Room as her blog is a wonderful discovery!
2. Learners At Home are from my neck of the woods...
3. ...as is Every Day Best (and a long lost college friend!)
4. Live Life with Your Kids is another neat CMer blog.
   
5. Over the summer I found Catholic Cuisine and we are actually going to incorporate it into our TORCH classes this fall. They have the lovely tea set up in the corner, too.
   
6. Heart of a Mother is another lovely and inspiring blog new to me.

I could also give this to most of my long time favorites, too!

Free Museum Day is Approaching

Saturday, September 26th is Museum Day, when loads of participating museums offer free admission. Which one shall we go to the year?

Living Science Author: Robert Gilmore

I only picked up The Wizard of Quarks yesterday at my favorite used books store, and so I have only read a little of it. Yet in researching this book and others by Robert Gilmore, Once Upon a Universe, Scrooge's Cryptic Carol, and Alice in Quantumland, I knew I had to post about these marvelous living science books.

Each book explains complicated physics through a modern retelling of a classic fairy tale. The Wizard of Quarks is an introduction to atomic physics told through Frank L. Baum's classic. Grimm's Fairy Tales are used to explain the universe in Once Upon a Universe: Not So Grimm Tales of Cosmology. Three ghosts visit a descendant of Dicken's famous character in Scrooge's Cryptic Carol: Visions of Energy, Time, and Quantum Nature. And then there's Alice in Quantumland, with the obvious nod to the Lewis Carroll classic.

Make no mistake, these are college-level books dealing with college-level concepts. I noticed that several comments on Amazon mention these books being enjoyed by elementary students, they are that fun, even if they didn't get all the concepts. It seems only scientists pan the books, and not for the content but rather for the fairy tales.

These books are rather pricey as new hardcovers but used copies are readily available at good prices. (I've already ordered the other three myself.) I will post a full review on Shelfari as soon as I finish these delightful finds!

So far Dorothy has encounter the very large witch of mass, who explains how her strength is far, far less than her sister, electromagnetism. She has two other sisters, too--strong (color) interaction and weak interaction.

Dorothy has also met the Observant Scarecrow in an electron probability field...

Six Week High School Webinar on Blood

I am teaching an online webinar course about the physiology and pathophysiology of blood called:

Blood in Sickness and in Health

"You won't faint at the sight of blood in this virtual class! We'll explore what blood is and does, how it is made, how it clots, and blood typing. We'll also look at how blood is tested in a medical laboratory, what the results are when a person is healthy and how it changes in illness. Each student will present their own research into a specific blood disorder of his or her choosing."

If you register before August 15th, the cost is an incredible $60; after that the cost is $75. There's an additional $20 lab course; one-time access to a 400x microscope is required.

The course starts Friday, September 18th and continues for six consecutive weeks. The live webinar portions are every Friday from 3:00 to 4:15 pm EDT. This is a great opportunity for high school homeschool. I am really excited about this course and the others offered by Homeschool Connections.