In this Activity, students investigate the chemistry of the popular Salt Crystal Garden. They grow salt crystals by evaporation from aqueous solutions containing various mixtures of table salt, ammonia, and laundry bluing in order to determine the purpose of each component.
In this Activity, students extract DNA from liver and onion cells, and precipitate the DNA. The Activity fits well with a discussion of nucleic acids, hydrogen bonding, genetic coding, and heredity. DNA extraction can also be used in conjunction with a discussion of polymers and their properties.
In this Activity, students use building-block car kits to explore stoichiometry in a concrete manner. They determine the relationship between the number and mass of each required car component (the pieces in the kit) and the mass of the final product (the completed car). This Activity works well as either an introduction or review of stoichiometry.