C. B. Atlas: Animations - Temperature Experiments

Temperature Experiments

investigate cooling rates of shallow and deep water
analyze Chesapeake Bay temperature information
interpret effects of temperature variations on living organisms

6.1, LS.1, PS.1, ES.1 - The student will plan and conduct investigations.
LS.7 - The student will investigate and understand that organisms within an ecosystem are dependent on one another and the nonliving environment.
LS.10 - The student will investigate and understand how organisms adapt to biotic and abiotic factors in a biome.
PS.7 - The student will investigate and understand temperature scales, heat, and heat transfer.
PH.7 - The student will investigate and understand that kinetic molecular theory can be applied to solve quantitative problems involving pressure, volume, and temperature.

Materials:

two 250 ml beakers
hot water
flat, shallow pan or other container (6 by 10 inches or larger)
two thermometers or graphing calculator and CBL with temperature probes

Procedure:

How does the rate of cooling in shallow water compare to the rate of cooling in deeper water? Ask students to make a prediction and then test the prediction with an experiment.

Fill 2 beakers with 250 ml. of hot, but not boiling, water. The water in both beakers should be approximately the same temperature. Pour one beaker of water into a flat, shallow container. Leave the water in the second beaker.

BEGIN RECORDING TEMPERATURE IMMEDIATELY AFTER POUR WATER INTO THE PAN.

Measure the temperature at 1 minute intervals for 10 minutes. Graph the data and compare the results.

Note the variation in speed of cooling of the water in the shallow areas as compared to the channel. Which area is quickest to cool? Examine the animation closely to see.

Now we know that the shallow water cools and warms more quickly than the channel. What does this mean? Many questions can be asked - and investigated online!

For example, does the temperature variation have an effect on the other factors found in the Bay animations? (These factors are phosphate, nitrate and dissolved oxygen.)

Does the temperature variation affect the life of the Bay? Data on the Virginia Institute of Marine Science web site may help here.

Connect to: http://www.vims.edu
--- go to: "other information services"---
--- then, go to: "trawl survey data" ---

The Virginia Institute of Marine Science has been monitoring Bay speciesvia trawl surveying (collecting organisms with a trawl net) since 1955.

In this time a massive amount of data has been collected. This data is available on the VIMS homepage in easy to read graph and indice form (Go to other information resources and from there to the trawl survey data)

Every month the Fish Hawk conducts a survey from the mouth of the Chesapeake Bay to the fresh water interface of the James, York, and Rappahannock Rivers.

Each month, 20-50 thousand fish and invertebrates and collected and processed. The survey averages 70 species per month with 223 species having been collected over the last 40 years.

Another interesting note is the technology used to measure the fish - an electronic fish measuring board which automatically records the size into a computer database is described on the trawl survey page.

This is a good experiment in which to use a graphing calculator and a calculator based (CBL) laboratory data collector. Choose a CBL program that graphs temperature over time.

The programs available for downloading from the Vernier Software web site [at end of lesson] are an excellent choice for this experiment. These programs are more flexible than many of the available CBL programs. There is also excellent documentation in the readme file for the programs.

The temperature program is in the CHEMBIO group.

This group of programs offers a menu with numerous choices. First, you will need to select and set your probe. It is possible to set up multiple probes. One can be set for the shallow experiment and one for the deep experiment. Once you have selected a probe, you will be offered options for that probe.

Once you have selected the temperature probe and are ready to collect data, you will be offered the opportunity to choose a time graph for you experiment. With many of CBL programs the duration of the experiment is determined by the program - you canÕt change the time without editing the program.

Here is an example of a graph from a graphing calculator using a CBL with two probes. The temperature of the deep water probe (top line) had already dropped considerably when data collecting began. (This data was collected at 5 second intervals. 75 samples per probe were graphed. A yscale of 2 was used.)

Continue at mid-lesson
Go to top of lesson

Information about graphing calculators, CBL's and probes, as well as programs to run them are available on the following web sites:

Vernier Software web site	http://www.vernier.com
Texas Instruments web site	http://www.ti.com

Return to Top of Lesson