Students Test Conductivity in Chemistry

Pete Ruden
Staff Reporter

A  fire experiment done in chemistry classes.
Photo Courtesy of Mr. Busch.

            Playing with fire is a fun activity for students in school. Right? Last week in chemistry, students made fire expand by putting flour into a funnel and blowing into a hose at a flame.

            “It was pretty cool,” said sophomore Sami Craig. “It didn’t work at first, so we were all skeptic, but once it worked really good, it was pretty cool.”

            In class, students have been learning about covalent and molecular bonds and the flame was carbon based, so that is how the flour made the flame expand. It was also tried with salt, which made the flame turn yellow, because the salt is ionic.

Earlier in the week, chemistry classes tested the electric conductivity of different liquids, including Gatorade, chocolate milk, pink lemonade and pickle juice. Pickle juice had the highest conductivity, uncovering possible fallacies about Gatorade and Powerade’s advertising.

“I thought it was a cool and it was a unique way of showing which samples had ions and why,” Craig said.

After a fun start to the semester, classes are going to stay fun and include different experiments. They have set the bar high for themselves.