Sink and Float

using base 10 blocks for counting

For the past couple of weeks, we have been working on properties of water.  We have explored density, surface tension and sink and float.  We have made boats out of wood, foil, paper and recycled items.  We have worked hard at sinking our boats with pennies or other heavy objects.  We have made boats in different sizes and shapes to see what worked best.  We have made hypotheses and drawn conclusions.  We discovered that foil floats if it is flat but sinks if it is crunched into a little ball.  We experimented with rocks and pumice, marbles and rubber balls, slices of bread and balls of bread and we even tried different sizes of pumpkins and silvers of pumpkin.   We learned that having a sail didn't make any difference when it comes to whether a boat sinks or floats.  We'll be continuing with our study of water for a while, we're not sure yet where it will go....maybe forms of water or uses of water? There are lots of possibilities!