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Kindergarten students have engaged in a study of weather around the world! Here is a link to some great ideas that connect to weather!

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Today's round up is full of great weather science experiments and investigation ideas. Observing the weather is a great way to practice recording and displaying data as well as learning about weather and how it changes from day to day.

Weather Science Experiments

How to measure rainfall

A simple rain gauge is an easy way to measure rainfall. Don't forget to record the results and empty it each day.

Find out how hard it's raining with Rainy Day Mum.

Wind Experiments

If you want to get crafty, try making a pinwheel like this one from Red Ted Art. You should find it spins more on windy days.

Inspiration Laboratories makes a great model hurricane.

Storm in a Jar

We made a storm in a jar to demonstrate storms on Jupiter in This Is Rocket Science.

I'll blow your house down

Can you blow down the Three Little Pigs House?

Build your own anemometer to measure wind speed.

Find out which direction the wind is blowing by making your own wind vane.

Water Cycle Investigations

This fun mini water cycle is a great way to illustrate the water cycle.

We love this LEGO water cycle model from Edventures too.

Find out how water evaporates in this easy activity.

Set up a water cycle in a bag!

Homemade Weather Station

Did you know you can make a very simple weather station using pinecones?

More weather science for kids

Make an easy barometer to measure air pressure with The Consortium.

We love these sun prints from Creative Family Fun too.

These weather sensory bottles would be great for younger children from Twodaloo.

Learn about clouds with this easy rain cloud in a jar.

Can you think of any more weather science themed activities?

Why is the sky blue?

When light from the Sun enters the atmosphere it contains all the colours of the rainbow, which all together appear as white light. Gases in the atmosphere make the light slow down, change direction and scatter. Blue light is scattered the most, which is why we see the sky as blue.

What makes a rainbow?

It is the refraction of light which makes the sky look blue. Rainbows are formed in a similar way, except it's rain or another water source ( you can demonstrate this with a hosepipe ) which makes the light we see to be split up into its constituent colours.

We only see rainbows when the sun is behind us with water droplets falling in front.

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Weather for Kids - Fun Weather Science Experiments for kids

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Today's round up is full of great weather science experiments and investigation ideas. Observing the weather is a great way to practice recording and displaying data as well as learning about weather and how it changes from day to day. A simple rain gauge is an easy way to measure rainfall.

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It's basketball season! Your athlete might get excited to see if they can make every shot using geometry!

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Please ensure you have JavaScript enabled in your browser. If you leave JavaScript disabled, you will only access a portion of the content we are providing. Here's how.

Abstract

If you've ever played or watched basketball, you might already know that your chances of successfully banking a shot on the backboard are higher in certain positions on the basketball court, even when keeping the distance from the hoop the same. Ever wondered what would account for this? Do you think you could actually explain this using geometry? This science project will put your knowledge of geometry and algebra to good use. You will calculate and quantify how much more difficult it is to score from different positions. You will also build a scale model to test your calculations. Will these results line up with the on-court experience?

Objective

Use algebra and geometry to calculate the relative probability of making a successful bank shot from different positions on the court, keeping the distance to the hoop constant. Then test if you can reproduce your predictions with a scale model.

Credits

Sabine De Brabandere, PhD, Science Buddies

Cite This Page

General citation information is provided here. Be sure to check the formatting, including capitalization, for the method you are using and update your citation, as needed.

MLA Style

Science Buddies Staff. "Basketball: The Geometry of Banking a Basket." Science Buddies, 23 June 2020, https://www.sciencebuddies.org/science-fair-projects/project-ideas/Sports_p064/sports-science/basketball-the-geometry-of-banking-a-basket. Accessed 6 Nov. 2020.

APA Style

Science Buddies Staff. (2020, June 23). Basketball: The Geometry of Banking a Basket. Retrieved from https://www.sciencebuddies.org/science-fair-projects/project-ideas/Sports_p064/sports-science/basketball-the-geometry-of-banking-a-basket

Last edit date: 2020-06-23

Introduction

People say playing sports helps improve academic results. Would academic analysis of the game also improve your performance on the court? Test it out with this science project. Have a close look at the geometry of shooting a basket using the backboard. Would geometric analysis indicate that shooting from the side of the hoop-as shown in Figure 1-is easier, more difficult, or equally difficult than shooting from a more central position? Could geometric analysis help you make better decisions on the court?

A basketball shot at the hoop is a great example of projectile motion, or the motion of an object (in this case a ball) that moves through the air. The science of projectile motion lets you predict the projectile's (here a ball's) trajectory, or the exact path the projectile (or ball) will take.

In real basketball, the ball follows a complicated three-dimensional trajectory as it moves through the air, bounces off the backboard, and goes into the net. However, it is an example of a compound motion, combining a vertical and a horizontal motion. Both these motions are independent of each other, and thus, can be studied separately. In this science project, you will study the horizontal movement of the basketball, which reduces the three-dimensional motion to two dimensions. This "bird's-eye view" of the ball's movement will result in easier analysis for your science project.

Are you surprised that the ball's vertical and horizontal motions happen independently?

You can experiment with this type of compound motion by letting identical objects (like two coins) fall to the ground using different paths (e.g. one coin launched off sideways from a table, while the second one is nudged right off the edge and falls straight down from the table). See when both objects land. If vertical movement (falling to the ground) happens independent of the horizontal movement, both coins should touch the ground at the same time, even though the first object took a longer path.

Your goal is to determine the relative difficulty to shoot the basket using the backboard from different positions on the court. Imagine looking at the court from a bird's-eye (top-down) viewpoint. Now imagine a player is shooting a ball. What would you see? Can you visualize the trajectory of the ball being shot, bouncing off the backboard, and landing in the basket? Do you imagine a trajectory as shown in Figure 2?

Figure 2 also introduces the angle of incidence and the angle of reflection for a projectile. The angle of incidence is the angle between the path of the ball as it approaches a surface (here the backboard) and the line perpendicular to the surface (a line perpendicular to a surface is also called normal to the surface or the surface normal ) . The angle of reflection represents the angle between the path of the ball as it bounces back from a surface and the line perpendicular to the surface. In this science project, you will assume the ball is thrown without spin. In this case, projectile motion predicts the ball will bounce back under the same angle, or in other words, the angle of incidence equals the angle of reflection.

In the first part of your science project, you will use algebra and geometry to study one aspect of the shot and determine its impact on relative difficulty of making a shot from different positions that are the same distance from the hoop. Here is a short review of some properties of triangles that will be used in the calculations.

The Pythagorean theorem is probably the first thing that comes to mind when thinking of triangles. It is valid in right triangles and states that the square of the hypotenuse (the length of the side opposite the right [90°] angle) equals the sum of the squares of the length of the other two sides.

Do you also remember the special properties of the 30-60-90 and the 45-45-90 triangles?

A 30-60-90 triangle is a triangle with 30°, 60° and 90° angles, as shown in Figure 3. One side of this triangle has a length exactly half of the length of the hypotenuse. Can you use the Pythagorean theorem to verify that the length of the other side is [Please enable JavaScript to view equation] times the length of the hypotenuse?

A 45-45-90 triangle is special because two sides of this right triangle have equal lengths. Can you use the Pythagorean theorem to verify this length is exactly [Please enable JavaScript to view equation] times the length of the hypotenuse?

You will also need to know the properties of similar triangles. Similar triangles are triangles that have identical angles, but might differ in size. Figure 4 shows two similar triangles. Note the corresponding sides of similar triangles have lengths in the same ratio. In other words, if a triangle with sides a, b, and c is similar to a triangle with sides A, B, and C, then a/A = b/B= c/C.

There is one more mathematical concept to introduce before you can start your calculations. In this science project, you will study one aspect of the shot and calculate how this influences chances of scoring when the player is placed at different locations on the court. Scientists use relative probability to express how much more or less likely something is expected to happen compared to a chosen baseline. A relative probability higher than 1 indicates it is more probable, or easier, to successfully shoot a banked shot from that position than from the baseline position. A relative probability lower than 1 indicates it is less probable, or more difficult, to successfully shoot a banked shot from that position than it is from the baseline position.

Now, time to get started! Make sure you keep your science project in mind the next time you are deciding whether or not to use the backboard to take a shot!

Terms and Concepts

Projectile motion

Trajectory

Compound motion

Independent

Angle of incidence

Angle of reflection

Pythagorean theorem

Right triangles

Hypotenuse

30-60-90 triangle

45-45-90 triangle

Similar triangles

Relative probability

Questions

What property allows analysis of the projectile motion in the horizontal plane and the vertical direction separately?

How does the trajectory of a basketball shot look in the horizontal plane?

What is the angle of incidence and the angle of reflection for a ball hitting an object and how are they related, assuming the ball has no spin?

What does relative probabilities of 200% or 50% indicate?

How are the lengths of the three sides of a right triangle related?

Do you expect any position on the court to have a higher chance of resulting in a score using the backboard when analyzing the geometry of the situation?

Do you expect any players placed on the court at equal distance from the center of the basket to have a better chance of scoring using the backboard in the real game?

Materials and Equipment

Test ball, approximately 4.5 cm diameter. A mini sports squeeze ball like the mini sports foam balls from Amazon.com work well.
Note: You will need to scale the dimensions of the cardboard tube and the number of poster boards up or down to accommodate a smaller or larger ball.

Books (2), identical thickness

Flat wall making a 90° angle with a flat floor

Ruler, metric

Poster boards (2), 22 x 28 inch; flexible or hard poster board will both work.

Thick markers, black and red

Compass

Protractor

Sheet of paper

Tape that does not damage the wall

Scissors

Cardboard roll (50 cm long if you work with a 4.5 cm ball); the inner tube of packing paper works well. Note : Choose something that comes on a sturdy cardboard tube, not on a flimsy wrapping paper tube.)

Cutting board

Toilet paper roll

Utility knife or craft knife

Highlighter

Lab Notebook

Science Buddies, a 501(c)(3) public charity, and keep our resources free for everyone. Our top priority is student learning. If you have any comments (positive or negative) related to purchases you've made for science projects from recommendations on our site, please let us know. Write to us at Disclaimer: Science Buddies participates in affiliate programs with Home Science Tools, Amazon.com, Carolina Biological, and Jameco Electronics. Proceeds from the affiliate programs help support scibuddy@sciencebuddies.org.

Experimental Procedure

Defining the Variables

For this science project, you will position your player at a fixed distance from the middle of the basket. Three meters (m) will be used as the example in this procedure. Feel free to replace this distance by your own preferred distance. It is important to stick to one distance throughout the project, though, as you want to study the influence of the player's angular position. Also note that metric units are used, as this is the convention for science projects.

Once you have specified the distance, the position of the player is defined by the angle that the line from the player through the middle of the basket makes with a line parallel to the backboard, as shown in Figure 5.

The 90° position is chosen as baseline, which means you will calculate how much more or less difficult it is to make the shot from the 30°, 45°, and 60° positions with respect to the 90° position.

Calculating the Chance to Score

Depending on the player's angular position, the player will have to aim the ball at a different location on the backboard for the ball to end up in the basket, as shown in Figure 6.

The player always aims to get the ball in the middle of the basket. Fortunately, there is some wiggle room. As shown in Figure 7, the ball can bounce off of a slightly different spot on the backboard and still bounce into the basket.

How much wiggle room a player has is one indicator of how difficult it is to make the shot. You can calculate relative probabilities by comparing the length of this "wiggle room" (the length of the area on the backboard that a player can hit and still make the shot) for different player positions. In this approach, you calculate the relative sizes of the areas at which a player can choose to aim as explained later in the procedure. This works if you assume that the player can aim the ball perfectly every time. Another approach is to calculate the angular wiggle room the player has when aiming the ball (for example, plus or minus two degrees), assuming the player knows exactly which spot on the backboard to aim at. The calculations are slightly different in this case, as explained in the Variations section. In the real game, the relative probability is a combination of both of these and other aspects.

Some general notes before you start the calculations:

Although in sports the distances are often indicated in inches and yards, calculations will be done in the metric system (centimeters and meters). Be sure to make appropriate conversions where needed.

All figures indicate the angle defining the position of the player as β. The first time you go through these calculations, fill in the angle 30°. At later iterations, you will do the calculations for the 45°, the 60°, and the 90° positions. Fill in the appropriate number for β each time you go through the calculations.

At any step in your calculations, remember to verify if the obtained distances make sense. As an example, a ball hitting the backboard at 10 m away from the center of the backboard does not seem correct. Frequent checks will help you catch mistakes early on.

Copy the table in your lab notebook; it will allow you to systematically keep track of your calculations as you go through them for different angular positions.
Note: If you are able to work symbolically until you arrive at an expression for X₁ as a function of the other variables (β, Xtot, Ytot, ...)- please do set up the equation and plug in the numbers at the end. If this is difficult for you, plug in numbers at each step.

Make a drawing similar to the one shown in Figure 8. Concentrate on the yellow triangle.

1. Calculate the length of all sides of the yellow right triangle. Note that you know angle β and the length of the hypotenuse.

2. Add the appropriate distances, if any, to obtain the length of Xtot (the distance in the X direction from the player's position to the middle of the ball as it enters the hoop) and Ytot (the distance in the Y direction from the player's position to the backboard) indicated in black in the figure. Note that you might have to convert inches into meters.

3. Note your results down in your lab notebook in the "Ball lands central" rows in your table like Table 1.

Make a drawing similar to the one in Figure 9. You want to find X₁, as this will indicate the distance from the center line where the ball needs to hit the backboard and bounce back into the basket. Note that the drawing is made to reflect that the ball bounces back into the center of the basket. The center line refers to the line perpendicular to the backboard going trough the center of the basket.

1. Concentrate on green (with sides X₂, Y₂, Z₂) and blue (with sides X₁, Y₁, Z₁) triangles. Since the angle of incidence is equal to the angle of reflection, these two triangles are similar. Use this information to write down an equation between Y₁, Y₂, X₁, X₂.

2. As you can see from the Figure 9, Y₂ and Ytot are identical. You also know Y₁, and you are trying to find X₁. You still need to identify X₂.

3. Since you know Xtot from step 2, find an equation that relates X 1, X₂, and Xtot.

4. Use the equation obtained in step 3.c. to express X₂ as a function of X₁ and Xtot.

5. Substitute your expression for X₂ in terms of X₁ and Xtot in the equation you formed in step 3.a.

6. Reorganize your expressions so you get X₁ as a function Ytot, Y₁, and Xtot.

7. If you did not do it yet, plug the values for Ytot, Y₁, and Xtot into your expression from step 3.f., and solve for X₁. Record your result in your data table next to the variable X₁ (m) - ball lands central.

8. Do a reality check; is the spot indicated by your distance still within the backboard?

Repeat step 3. When necessary, change your procedure to account for the situation where the ball barely makes it through the left edge of the basket, as shown in Figure 10 (light yellow ball).

1. Start by making a new drawing or by adding the new situation to your previous drawing in a different color.

2. Identify which, if any of the variables Ytot, Y₁, Y₁, X₂, and Xtot are unchanged. Record these in your data table.

3. For the variables that do change, do you know by how much they will change? For example, Xtot will be less or more as the ball will enter to the left or to the right of the central position. Can you identify how much less, knowing a basketball has a diameter of 9.4 inches and the radius of the basket is 9 inches?

4. Can you see if the relationships between the variables you established in step 3.a. and 3.b. still hold? If so, you can use the relationship established in step 3.f. with the new values of Ytot, Y₁, and Xtot to calculate the distance X₁ (m) - ball lands left. This is the farthest point to the left for the angle β that will still result in the ball bouncing into the basket.

5. Do a reality check; is the spot indicated by your distance still within the backboard?

1. Repeat step 4 considering the situation where the ball barely makes it through the basket to the right of the central position, as shown in Figure 10 (light blue ball). This calculation will yield distance X₁ (m), ball lands right. This is the farthest point to the right for this angle β that will still result in the ball bouncing into the basket.

2. To calculate the length of the area on the backboard that will result in the ball bouncing into the basket, subtract distance [X₁ (m) - ball lands right] from distance [X₁ (m) - ball lands left]. Note your results down in your data table. This completes your calculations for angle 30°. Once you have done the calculations for all the angles in the following steps, you can calculate the relative probability.

3. Repeat steps 2-6 again for the following positions: 45° and 60°.

4. Repeat steps 2-6 again for the 90° position. Note that this position looks slightly different, as indicated in Figure 11. Verify that the equations you identified are still valid for this configuration.

Three different trajectories of a basketball bouncing off of the backboard and into the basket when shot from a position perpendicular to the backboard. A basketball can be bounced slightly to the left or right of center and still make it into the basket due to the size of the basket being larger than the ball.

Figure 11. Figure showing the configuration for the 90° position for the ball entering in the center (orange), to the right (light blue), or to the left (light pink) of the central position.

1. Now that you have obtained the lengths that make the shot, you are ready to calculate the relative probability.
Divide the obtained length for each position by the length for the 90° position. Note the 90° position should have a "1" as relative probability, as this position was chosen as the baseline.

2. Do your results confirm or contradict what you expected? Does it seem logical in retrospect?

Testing Your Calculations with a Scale Model

Now that you have calculated the relative probability using geometry, you can test if you can reproduce these numbers using a scale model. How to build the scale model and take data is explained in the procedure of the science Project Idea Basketball: Will You Bank the Shot?

Put your players in your scale model at the same positions as you did for your calculations: a 3 m distance from the center of the hoop (scaled down to the distance in your model) and at 30°, 45°, 60°, and 90° angles.

Use the data from your scale model trails to calculate the length of the area on the backboard that bounces the ball back into the basket and the relative probabilities.

Comparing and Analyzing Your Results

This section will provide you with some information about how to analyze your results.

1. Compare the results obtained from your scale model with the results obtained from your calculations:

1. For each angular position, compare the length of the contact line that made the shot.

2. Compare for each angular position the obtained relative probability.

2. If you see any differences between your scale model results and your calculated results, try to answer the following questions:

1. Can you explain what causes these differences?

2. Is the result of your scale model more accurate than, less accurate than, or the same as the results of your calculations?

3. Can you think of ways to improve your calculations or your scale model?

3. Make scatter plots of your data. Where possible, plot both your calculated results and test model results on the same graph, using color coding to differentiate between the calculated and scale model results. Here are some suggestions:

1. Plot your relative probability (on the y-axis) versus the player's position (angle).

2. Plot the length of the area that results in a score (on the y-axis) versus the player's position (angle).

3. Plot both the minimum distance from the central line and the maximum distance from the central line on the y-axis versus the player's angular position (angle) on the x-axis.

4. Do you see a trend in your plots or your data? What could you conclude? Does one position result in more scores using the backboard than the other?

5. Are your findings in alignment with what you expected?

1. If you play basketball, did you have a similar experience on the court?

2. If you can find "shot charts" for real basketball players indicating the success rate of banked shots for different positions on the court, compare them with your findings.

3. Can you explain any differences identified in step 5.a. or 5.b.? What other factors (geometric and non-geometric) might influence your chance to score. As an example, would aiming be more accurate at large or small angles?

4. You constrained yourself to two dimensions for this science project; would adding the vertical motion change your calculations?

If you like this project, you might enjoy exploring these related careers:

Variations

In this science project, you changed the position of the player by changing the angle and keeping the distance to the center of the hoop constant. Try the project again, this time keeping the angle constant and analyzing the influence of changing the distance to the hoop.

Add the 0° position to your analysis, or use trigonometry to add more angular positions to your analysis.

If you have some basic trigonometry knowledge, you can find a symbolic expression for the relative probability as a function of the player's angular position. Then plot this function, with relative probability on the y-axis and the player's angular position on the x-axis. This will give you information about how the relative probability changes with changing angular position, taking all positions (all angles) into account.

Ask some of your basketball-playing friends to test their success rates from the analyzed positions, using the backboard. Compare the average of these real-life results with the results obtained in your calculations and/or your test situation. Analyze what might account for the differences between your calculations, your scale model, and shooting on an actual court.

The calculations in this science project assume that the player can throw the ball with perfect aim every time. In reality, there may be some error when the player throws the ball, resulting in the ball going a few degrees to the left or to the right, as shown in Figure 12. Can you calculate the relative probabilities using this angular "wiggle room" instead of the linear wiggle room on the backboard? How do the two methods compare; do they give the same results, or are they different?

Three different trajectories of a basketball bouncing off of the backboard and into the basket when shot from the left side of the basket. A basketball can be bounced slightly to the left or right of center and still make it into the basket due to the size of the basket being larger than the ball.

Figure 12. You can also calculate the relative probability to successfully bank a shot by comparing the angular wiggle room for different positions on the court. The player displayed in this drawing has wiggle room of δ degrees.

Use geometry and algebra to analyze in which direction you should throw the ball for a running player to catch it.

Look up "shot charts" for real basketball players (for example, do an online image search for "NBA shot chart") and compare your data to these shot charts. Does data from real basketball games match the trends you saw in your experiment, or not? What other factors do you think could influence a real game that were not present in your experiment?

Ask an Expert

The Ask an Expert Forum is intended to be a place where students can go to find answers to science questions that they have been unable to find using other resources. If you have specific questions about your science fair project or science fair, our team of volunteer scientists can help. Our Experts won't do the work for you, but they will make suggestions, offer guidance, and help you troubleshoot.

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Basketball: The Geometry of Banking a Basket | Science Project

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Please ensure you have JavaScript enabled in your browser. If you leave JavaScript disabled, you will only access a portion of the content we are providing. Here's how. If you've ever played or watched basketball, you might already know that your chances of successfully banking a shot on the backboard are higher in certain positions on the basketball court, even when keeping the distance from the hoop the same.

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Observe the regular, predictable patterns of the Sun, Moon, and stars in the sky in this media gallery from WGBH. Interact with the animated storybook to observe and predict patterns of the Sun, Moon, and stars over a day and analyze evidence of the apparent movement of the Sun along the arc-like path over a day in a time-lapse video.

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Students in grade 2 have learned all about fossils, the tools paleontologists use to uncover fossils, the process of fossilization, and even wrote a narrative about a paleontologist the moment they find a fossil. Follow this link to design an experiment that discovers the conditions that are required to make the best cast fossil!

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Please ensure you have JavaScript enabled in your browser. If you leave JavaScript disabled, you will only access a portion of the content we are providing. Here's how.

Difficulty

Time Required

Short (2-5 days)

Material Availability

Readily available.

Safety

This project uses plaster of Paris. Read and follow the safety instructions on the packaging, including wearing gloves and avoiding breathing in the dust. Adult supervision is required.

Abstract

Have you ever stood close to a fossilized T. rex skull and counted its razor-sharp teeth? Or, have you seen a fossilized stegosaurus skeleton and thought about how it defended itself with tail spikes and armored plates? A trip to a natural history museum lets you imagine what dinosaurs looked like and wonder what life with them on Earth was like. Fossils give us information about animals and plants that lived long ago. Certain places around the world contain more fossils than others. Why? Would the type of soil play a role? In this geology project, you will make fossils and see if certain kinds of soil produce better fossils.

Objective

To make cast fossils using a seashell and three types of soils, and determine if the quality of the cast fossil depends on the kind of soil in which it was created.

Credits

Michelle Maranowski, PhD, Science Buddies

Cite This Page

General citation information is provided here. Be sure to check the formatting, including capitalization, for the method you are using and update your citation, as needed.

MLA Style

Science Buddies Staff. "Fantastic Fossilization! Discover the Conditions For Creating the Best Cast Fossils." Science Buddies, 28 July 2017, https://www.sciencebuddies.org/science-fair-projects/project-ideas/Geo_p046/geology/conditions-for-creating-the-best-cast-fossils. Accessed 2 Oct. 2019.

APA Style

Science Buddies Staff. (2017, July 28). Fantastic Fossilization! Discover the Conditions For Creating the Best Cast Fossils. Retrieved from https://www.sciencebuddies.org/science-fair-projects/project-ideas/Geo_p046/geology/conditions-for-creating-the-best-cast-fossils

Last edit date: 2017-07-28

Introduction

Teeth, jaws, skulls, claws! Are we talking about a scary movie? Nope, we are talking about fossils. When you look at a fossil, you see something that used to exist in prehistoric times, before recorded human history. A dinosaur fossil can tell us about what that animal used to eat, how big it was, and how it used to move. But, fossils are not just dinosaur bones; they can also include fossilized plants, leaves, insects, footprints, and many, many other things from the past.

How are fossils made? In the case of a skeleton, after the animal died, the body was buried in sand and sediment, which protected it from predators. The skin and flesh slowly decayed until all that was left were the bones. Meanwhile, layers of sand and sediment continued to cover the bones. The bones remained buried under layers of sediment hundreds of feet deep, slowly turning from bone to stone.

There are four different kinds of fossils: original remains, trace fossils, mold fossils, and cast fossils. Table 1 describes each type of fossil in detail.

Fossils are found all over the world, but some areas contain more fossils than others. Why? Could it be because the soil is different from place to place? Some areas may have more sand and others more sediment or soil. Does it matter? In this experiment you will use different soils, a seashell (or other object with ridges), and plaster of Paris to make cast fossils. The soils you will use are sand, moist topsoil, and a mixture of sand and topsoil. You will press the shell into each type of soil, remove it, and then make a cast in each spot. Will a certain type of soil make a better cast fossil than the others? Can you make a hypothesis about which soil creates a better fossil? In a good cast fossil, you can see all of the details in the cast that are part of the thing that is fossilized. Time to start fossilizing and find the answer!

Terms and Concepts

Questions

What is a fossil?

What can you learn from studying fossils?

What is the difference between a mold fossil and a cast fossil?

What is amber and how is it related to fossilization?

Scientists have found and studied fossilized wooly mammoths. How are wooly mammoths fossilized?

Bibliography

For help creating graphs, try this website:

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Materials and Equipment

Disposable aluminum pans, 7-15/16 x 5-7/8 x 1-13/16 inches (9)

Permanent ink pen

Dry measure cup, 1 cup

Dry measure cup, ½ cup

Play sand (14 cups)

Organic, moist topsoil (14 cups)

Seashell with ridges like a cockle, or other item with clear ridges or dimples. The seashell should have a diameter no smaller than a ping-pong ball and no larger than a softball.

Straw, plastic

Ruler, metric

Tweezers

Paper towels (1 roll)

Plaster of Paris (3 cups); small shells may require less plaster of Paris, large shells may require more.

Disposable bowls (9); bowls should be large enough to comfortably stir a 1-1/2 cup mixture in.

Plastic spoons (3)

Cold water

Lab notebook

Remember Your Display Board Supplies

Experimental Procedure

Preparing the Experiment

1. Prepare three disposable aluminum pans. On the side of the first pan, write "sand" using the permanent ink marker. On the side of the second pan, write "topsoil." On the side of the third pan, write "sand topsoil mix."

2. Using the 1 cup measure, place 3 cups of sand in the pan marked "sand." Smooth and level the surface of the sand.

3. Again using the 1 cup measure, place 3 cups of topsoil in the pan marked "topsoil." Smooth and level the surface of the topsoil.

4. Using the 1 cup measure and the ½ cup measure, place 1½ cups of sand in the pan marked "sand topsoil mix." Then, place 1½ cups of topsoil in the same pan. Mix the two soils together completely. Smooth and level the surface of the mixture.

5. With the marker and ruler, mark a ring around the straw 2 centimeters (cm) from the bottom. You will use the straw as a measure to press the shell into the soils to the same depth as marked on the straw.

Making the Cast Fossils

1. Gently place the shell in the sand pan. Use the bottom of the straw to press the shell down. Press until the ring mark on the straw is even with the surface of the sand.

2. Carefully lift the shell with the tweezers so that the impression in the sand doesn't shift or change. Use the straw to help lift up the shell. Wash the shell and dry it completely with a paper towel. Set the shell aside.

3. Repeat steps 1 and 2 with the pan of topsoil and again with the pan of sand-topsoil mix.

4. Once you have created the shell impression in all three types of soil, it is time to mix the plaster of Paris. Follow the directions that come with the plaster of Paris, making sure to mix two parts of plaster to one part cold water. Make enough (at least 1 cup of plaster of Paris and cup of water) to fill all three impressions.

1. Wear rubber gloves and try not to breathe in the dust from the plaster of Paris as you mix it.

2. The plaster of Paris will look like pudding when it is thoroughly mixed.

5. Slowly pour the plaster of Paris into the impression in each pan. Make sure that you have filled each impression completely. Try not to touch the plaster after filling the impression with it. Let the plaster harden overnight.

Repeating the Experiment

1. It is important to repeat the experiment to make sure that the information you get from your experiment, the data, is similar.

2. Repeat the first two sections of the Procedure, Preparing the Experiment and Making the Cast Fossils, two more times for a total of three trials. You can choose to do all three trials on the same day, or on different days.

Examine Your Cast Fossils

1. After waiting overnight, carefully remove the cast fossils and place them in their pans so that you know which fossil goes with which soil. Use a paper towel to clean each fossil carefully. Always make sure to keep each fossil with its pan.

2. Compare the cast fossils from each trial to the shell that you used to make them. Can you see any ridges or dimples in the cast fossil? Does a particular type of soil produce a better cast fossil? The perfect cast fossil would have all the same ridges and dimples as the shell you used to make the cast, and a poor cast would show no ridges or dimples. Write your observations down in your lab notebook.

3. You can use a camera to take pictures of your casts to go on your project display board.

4. If you would like to quantify your data (that is, show your results using numbers and graphs), try counting the number of ridges and the number of dimples in the real shell and in each impression. You can turn your data into a bar graph - ask an adult for help if you do not know how to make a bar graph.

1. Make a bar graph showing the number of ridges and dimples for the real shell and each impression.

2. There should be ten bars (one for the shell and nine for the cast fossils) in your graph.

3. Label the shell and types of soil for each impression on the x-axis. Mark the y-axis with the total number of dimples and impressions for each shell /cast fossil.

4. You can make your bar graph by hand or use the free online tool, Create a Graph, to make it on the computer.

5. Was your hypothesis wrong or correct? Either is fine as long as you can explain why.

If you like this project, you might enjoy exploring these related careers:

Just as a doctor uses tools and techniques, like X-rays and stethoscopes, to look inside the human body, geoscientists explore deep inside a much bigger patient-planet Earth. Geoscientists seek to better understand our planet, and to discover natural resources, like water, minerals, and petroleum oil, which are used in everything from shoes, fabrics, roads, roofs, and lotions to fertilizers, food packaging, ink, and CD's. The work of geoscientists affects everyone and everything. Read more

Where do we come from? Why do we walk upright? Why do we behave the way we do? These are just some of the big and fascinating questions that anthropologists try to answer. Anthropologists study all aspects of human life, in every region of the world, throughout all time. They might focus on everything from present-day cultures and human behavior, traditions, and prehistoric cultures to the biology and evolution of humans, or the origin and evolution of language. Read more

Variations

How does water in the soil affect the quality of the cast fossil? Mix in 4 tablespoons (tbsp.) of water for each cup of soil in the pan. Redo the experiment and investigate the impressions of the cast fossils. Were they better or worse at showing the same ridges and dimples as on the original shell?

What kinds of items make good cast fossils? Try experimenting with shells, leaves, and feathers.

Ask an Expert

The Ask an Expert Forum is intended to be a place where students can go to find answers to science questions that they have been unable to find using other resources. If you have specific questions about your science fair project or science fair, our team of volunteer scientists can help. Our Experts won't do the work for you, but they will make suggestions, offer guidance, and help you troubleshoot.

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Fantastic Fossilization! Discover the Conditions For Creating the Best Cast Fossils | Science Project

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Please ensure you have JavaScript enabled in your browser. If you leave JavaScript disabled, you will only access a portion of the content we are providing. Here's how. Difficulty Time Required Short (2-5 days) Material Availability Readily available. Safety This project uses plaster of Paris.

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Grade 3- Adaptations and the Wide World of Frogs

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Grade 3- Adaptations and the Wide World of Frogs

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Grade 4- Animal Behaviors:Animal Defenses

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Check out this photo album of last years Science Fair! This will give you a sense of what might go on the trifold board and how simple but cool the projects can be!

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The Science Behind the Perfect Football Kick

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Hockey Related- What slides best on ice?

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Check out this cool science experiment around what slides best on ice!

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Have you ever watched hockey and thought about the puck?

How fast is it going? And how does it go so fast?

Those questions inspired a fun winter science project: Hockey Science.

Can you combine hockey with science? Of course you can!

We don't have any hockey players in our family, but we definitely have hockey fans. Hockey is a hugely popular sport here in Minnesota for both girls and boys. We thought we'd have a little fun with hockey and turned it into a simple science experiment.

Or, if your sports loving kids are looking for a fun science fair idea, this project is perfect!
Disclosure: There are Amazon Affiliate and other affiliate links in this article which means, at no additional cost to you, we could receive compensation for our recommendations. You can read our full disclosure policy on our Disclosure Page for more details.

Our question: What will slide on ice?

Before we started our project, I needed to do a little prep.

I created a two-sided chart. The first side for our predictions and the second side for our results.

I also prepped a box of different items we already had on hand: glass marbles, muffin-tin crayons, milk jug caps, a rough piece of bark, a rough rock, puff balls, and small squares of felt.

Finally, I set a large sheet pan outside and filled it with water. Our sub-zero temperatures guaranteed that the water would freeze faster outside than in our own freezer. Brrrrrr! Stick your pan in the freezer if your day isn't as cold as mine.

Make a prediction - form your hypothesis.

I showed my oldest (age 5 1/2) the items and asked her if she thought they would slide easily on the ice. I had her make her predictions by making an "x" in the appropriate box, "slide" or "not slide".

Create your hypothesis by forming a statement: I predict ___________ will slide and ice and ____________ will not slide.

The hockey science experiment.

The experiment's always the fun part, isn't it?

It was time to see how well everything slid. We brought in our frozen sheet pan and started sliding our objects across it. My oldest marked our results the same way as she did our predictions.

We discovered that felt and pom poms didn't slide like we thought they would. And those glass marbles, wow! They slid the best!

Our conclusion.

The item that were smooth and light slid better than the items that were rough or soft.

We were exploring friction with our hockey science project. The rough (or fuzzy) items had more friction which slowed the objects down. The smoother the item, the less friction which meant they slid more quickly across the ice.

By now, we had a good idea as to why a hockey puck looks like it does.

But, how fast do those things really go?

Hockey pucks generally travel over 100 miles per hour and the fastest hockey shot clocked in at 110.3 miles per hour. (Source: Guinness Book of World Records) Wow!

You may also like one of these fun science projects:
Hot Chocolate Science Chemical Reactions with Pennies Will It Float? Making Boats Ice and Snow Experiments at Inspiration Laboratories How to Make a Magnifying Glass from Ice at Schooling a Monkey

My Must-Have Resources for Science Fun

I don't know about you, but I don't always have time to prep a fun science project. That's why I love Green Kid Crafts Discovery boxes. The boxes are packed full of projects that are fun and inviting. You can choose to get a subscription or a one-off box based off of a specific theme. Any one you choose would be a lot of fun!

Here are some of our favorites (you can purchase and find out more at each link):

Get a monthly subscription.
Kitchen Science Box Physics Box Find all their fun STEM and science boxes here.
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Wouldn't it be so much fun to get STEAM family activities delivered to your inbox? I think so! That's why I've created this fun series, STEAM Family Fun, to be delivered to your inbox. After going through all the letters in STEAM each week with a fun activity devoted to each, you'll start receiving a fun STEAM activity once a month. (And I'll also pop up in your inbox occasionally if I've got other fun things to share.)

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Have you ever watched hockey and thought about the puck? How fast is it going? And how does it go so fast? Those questions inspired a fun winter science project: Hockey Science. Can you combine hockey with science? Of course you can! We don't have any hockey players in our family, but we definitely have hockey fans.

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Leak Proof Bag Science Experiment for Kids

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This leak proof bag science experiment is sure to WOW your kids! All you need is two household supplies and you can do this water experiment with your kids too. This post contains affiliate links. Lately, the kids and I have been doing lots of neat science experiments.

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Learn about the water cycle through this cool experiment!

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This water cycle experiment combines science and history. Indians living on the Pacific Coast around the San Francisco bay would create shallow ponds of ocean water. They would place sticks in the water and allow the water to evaporate. As the water evaporated salt crystals would form on the sticks.

Indians would then bundle up the sticks and travel to the mountains where they exchanged the stick covered with salt for obsidian needed to make arrowheads. In this experiment you will use a bowl as the shallow pond and clay to stick your toothpicks in to collect the salt.

Materials

Directions

1. Pour hot water from the faucet into a cup.

2. Add a tablespoon of salt and stir until it is dissolved.

3. Add more salt one tablespoon at a time.

4. Continue adding salt until your solution is supersaturated and no more salt will dissolve.

5. Set the cup of salt water aside.

6. Make a small round ball with your modeling clay.

7. Stick the clay to the bottom of the bowl.

8. Continue creating small balls of clay and sticking them on the bowl until you have 8 or 10 on the bottom of the bowl.

9. Stick a single toothpick in each ball of clay so them are perpendicular to the bottom of the bowl.

10. Set the bowl in a warm area so the water can evaporate.

11. Each day look at the crystals forming on the sticks.

More Links to Earth Science Experiments

Simple Science Experiment, Rubber Band Shoot Have fun shooting rubber bands in this fun and easy experiment.

Simple Science Experiments, Pressing Layers Discover how bread slices can turn into sedimentary layers in this fun experiment.

Cool Science Experiments, Funny Bones In these fun experiments find out how you can create "funny bones" that can bend.

Easy Science Experiments, Pumice & Obsidian Find out the difference between pumice and obsidian and why one will float and the other will sink like a rock.

Volcano Science Experiment, Cinder Cones Have you ever wondered how volcanoes get their shape? Find out about cinder cones in this fun activity.

Water Cycle Experiment, Salt on a Stick This experiment combines science and history as it shows how Indians collected salt and exchanged it for obsidian.

Earth Science The links on this page include information on the Earth, the Rock Cycle, Volcanoes, experiments, activities and much more.

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# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
This water cycle experiment combines science and history. Indians living on the Pacific Coast around the San Francisco bay would create shallow ponds of ocean water. They would place sticks in the water and allow the water to evaporate. As the water evaporated salt crystals would form on the sticks.

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Learn about sedimentary rock through this cool experiment!

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Simple Science Experiments, Pressing Layers

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These simple science experiments demonstrate how sedimentary layers compress under pressure. In this experiment you will see the effects of pressure on dark and light slices of bread.

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Why Does A Golf Ball Have Dimples? | The Children’s Museum of Indianapolis

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Abstract

Have you ever wondered how fun toys like Silly Putty®, Gak™, and Slime™ are made? These products are so much fun because of the properties of polymers, which make them delightfully bouncy, stretchy, sticky, moldable, breakable, hard, soft, and just plain fun! In this science project you can be the developer of your own slime product by changing the amount of a key ingredient. By observing the physical properties of your results, you can choose the best recipe for your new product.

Summary

Objective

Determine the best recipe for your own homemade slime by changing the amount of a key ingredient and by observing physical properties.

Introduction

If you have ever played with slime, you know that it can be fun with all of its stretchy, bouncy, ickiness. Maybe you have noticed that some types of slime feel different than others. Have you ever wondered why slime behaves the way it does? It all has to do with chemistry. Chemistry is the study of matter, which is the stuff that everything around you is made of. Chemists are interested in finding out what different materials, such as slime, are made of, how these materials behave, and how they can be changed into other materials.

What is slime actually made of? If you have made slime before, you probably followed a recipe to put different ingredients together, similar to baking a cake. The ingredients used for slime usually include Elmer's® glue and borax. Elmer's glue is made up of a polymer. Polymers are long chain-shaped molecules.

The polymer chains in the Elmer's glue are long and very straight. The polymer chains can slide across each other easily, making the glue runny and "liquidy" (think of dumping a bunch of fresh-cooked spaghetti out of a pot). This changes, however, when you mix the glue with borax. The borax helps make connections between each of the polymer chains, as shown in Figure 1. This process is called crosslinking. This makes it harder for the polymer chains to slide around, making the glue thicker and turning it into "slime."

In this project, you will use contact lens solution to make slime. It contains other ingredients (boric acid and sodium borate) that react with baking soda (another ingredient in your slime) to make borax. You might wonder if it matters how much borax you add to the glue. Changing the recipe can change the properties of the slime! In science, a property is something about a material that you can observe and measure, for example its weight, color, or stickiness. In this science project, you will make slime with different amounts of contact lens solution. You will then test the slime and observe how its properties change as the recipe changes. Once you have tested all your slime recipes, you can decide for yourself which one results in slime that will be the most fun to play with. If you were going to sell slime as a toy, which recipe would you use?

Terms and Concepts

Bibliography

Learn about the history and chemistry of Silly Putty on this webpage:

Pop-Cult.com. (n.d.). Silly Putty. Retrieved August 27, 2013.

Here is a great site for learning about polymers: This web site at Chemistry 4 Kids has a great tutorial on chemistry, matter properties and mixtures. Go check it out:
For help creating graphs, try this website:

National Center for Education Statistics, (n.d.). Create a Graph. Retrieved June 25, 2020.

Materials and Equipment

Washable PVA school glue (like Elmer's®)

Water

Baking soda

Contact lens solution (must contain both boric acid and sodium borate in ingredients)

Food coloring (optional)

Measuring spoons

Measuring cups

Mixing bowl

Spatula

Ruler

Stopwatch

Kitchen countertop or other work surface that can get messy

Resealable plastic bags or food storage containers

Marker

Lab notebook

Experimental Procedure

Preparing Your Slime

1. In the mixing bowl, thoroughly mix 1/2 C water, 1/2 C glue, and a few drops of food coloring.

2. Add 1/2 tsp baking soda and mix completely.

3. Add 1 tbsp contact lens solution and stir vigorously until the mixture starts pulling away from the edges of the bowl.

4. Use your hands to knead the slime (fold it, squeeze it, and roll it) for 5-10 minutes until its texture stops changing.

5. Put the slime in a resealable plastic bag or food storage container. Use a marker to label the bag "1 tbsp contact lens solution."

6. Clean any residual slime off your mixing bowl and measuring spoons/cups. You should be able to peel the slime off in pieces.

7. Repeat steps 1-6 two more times, first using 2 tbsp and then 3 tbsp of contact lens solution. When you are done, you should have three batches of slime, as shown in Figure 2.

Testing Your Slime

Prepare a data table like Table 1 in your lab notebook.

1. Take your first batch of slime (with 1 tbsp contact lens solution) and play with it with your hands. What does it feel like? Is it stretchy? Squishy? Sticky? Rubbery? Write down your description of the slime in your data table. This is a qualitative observation (it uses things you can describe with your senses, not numbers).

2. Measure 1 tbsp of your first batch of slime. Since it does not behave like a regular liquid, you will need to mold and squish the slime into the measuring spoon in order to get approximately one tablespoon.

3. Roll the 1 tbsp of slime into a ball.

4. Place the ball of slime onto a flat, smooth surface, and immediately start your stopwatch.

5. After exactly one minute, measure the diameter (width) of the ball of slime in centimeters (cm) using a ruler (see Figure 3). Write this number down under Trial 1 in your data table. This is a quantitative observation (it uses a number that you measure).

1. Repeat steps 4-6 two more times for this batch of slime, for a total of three trials. Record your measurements in the data table under Trial 2 and Trial 3, respectively.

2. Repeat steps 2-7 for your other two batches of slime.

3. Calculate the average circle diameter for each batch of slime. Do this by adding up the diameters for each trial and then dividing by three. Record the average diameter for each batch of slime in the data table. Ask an adult if you need help.

4. Make a graph with the amount of contact solution on the horizontal axis and the average circle diameter on the vertical axis. You can use the Create a Graph website if you need help making a graph.

5. Based on your results, which slime was the runniest (spread out to make the biggest circle)? Which slime was the thickest (spread out to make the smallest circle)? How do these quantitative measurements relate to your qualitative observations?

6. Based on all your observations and measurements, which slime do you think is the "best"? If you were going to sell your slime as a toy, which recipe would you use? Why?

7. Store your slime in airtight containers if you want to play with it later. Dispose of any excess slime by putting it in the trash. Do not pour your slime down the drain or it will cause a clog.

Ask an Expert

Variations

Experiment with the other ingredients in your slime recipe. What happens if you change the amount of water, glue, or baking soda?

There are many other ingredients you can add to your slime to change its appearance or other properties. For example:

Glitter to make sparkly slime

Iron filings to make magnetic slime

Glow-in-the-dark paint to make glow-in-the-dark slime

Heat-sensitive pigment to make color-changing slime

There are other tests you can do to measure the properties of your slime. Here are a few ideas-can you think of more?

Measure density: what is the mass of a certain volume of the slime?

Roll 1 tbsp of slime into a ball. Pinch it with two fingers and let it drop down. Measure how long it takes to stretch a certain distance, or how far it stretches in a certain amount of time.

Roll the slime into a ball, drop it, and measure how high it bounces. This may be easier if you use a camera to film the slime bouncing and then analyze the video afterwards.

Compare what happens if you stretch the slime quickly vs. slowly.

Careers

If you like this project, you might enjoy exploring these related careers:

What makes it possible to create high-technology objects like computers and sports gear? It's the materials inside those products. Materials scientists and engineers develop materials, like metals, ceramics, polymers, and composites, that other engineers need for their designs. Materials scientists and engineers think atomically (meaning they understand things at the nanoscale level), but they design microscopically (at the level of a microscope), and their materials are used macroscopically... Read more

Chemical engineers solve the problems that affect our everyday lives by applying the principles of chemistry. If you enjoy working in a chemistry laboratory and are interested in developing useful products for people, then a career as a chemical engineer might be in your future. Read more

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Cite This Page

General citation information is provided here. Be sure to check the formatting, including capitalization, for the method you are using and update your citation, as needed.

MLA Style

Agee, Sara, Ben Finio, and Svenja Lohner. "Slime Chemistry." Science Buddies, 29 Dec. 2021, https://www.sciencebuddies.org/science-fair-projects/project-ideas/Chem_p012/chemistry/make-slime. Accessed 27 Sep. 2022.

APA Style

Agee, S., Finio, B., & Lohner, S. (2021, December 29). Slime Chemistry. Retrieved from https://www.sciencebuddies.org/science-fair-projects/project-ideas/Chem_p012/chemistry/make-slime

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Have you ever wondered how fun toys like Silly Putty®, Gak™, and Slime™ are made? These products are so much fun because of the properties of polymers, which make them delightfully bouncy, stretchy, sticky, moldable, breakable, hard, soft, and just plain fun!

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Magnetic Slime Recipe | Magnetic goo that shows you magnetic field lines!

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Mix up a batch of clear magnetic slime that allows you to see, and save, the magnetic field lines of various magnets. This is a great next step to our DIY magnetic field viewer!