One of my students favorite inquiry labs to begin the kinetics unit is to create alka-seltzer rockets using old film canisters. Students are given a film canister, a quantity of alka seltzer of their own choosing and any materials available in the room to investigate factors that affect the rate of reaction.

Students generally choose to change the surface area of the tablet, the amount of water in the canister, the temperature of the water, other liquids besides water changes the time for the top of the canister to pop off. Some students measure how high the film canister top reaches.

For this activity students were given no procedure just a guiding question: “How does your factor affect the rate of reaction?” Students then had to create a one sentence claim, provide evidence and support it with reasoning. Students were given 80 minutes to determine what they wanted to test, do the experiment and get their CER boards ready for review. This was done with a mixed class of general and special education tenth grade students.

As opposed to a regular argumentation session, we had a glow and grow session, where students had to provide positive and negative feedback for each board. This can be done by having students walk around as groups and put a specific color post-it (usually green) for a way the group can grow, and different color post-it (typically yellow) for features of the board which were particularly well done by the group.

I have included an example of one CER board that was presented along with accompanying comments below:

Glow and Grow Whiteboard #1

	Student Glow Comments Multiple trials completed Easy to read Clear
	Student Grow Comments Column unit (seconds) should be listed at the top of the data table instead of each box. The reasoning is not specific to this reaction. This reasoning could apply to many reactions, be more specific information should be provided for the reaction you observed. Justification of the procedure was not provided.