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How Can Gravity Make Something Go Up?
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In this activity, learners use cheap, thin plastic garbage bags to quickly build a solar hot air balloon. In doing so, learners will explore why hot air rises.
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Lava Lamps
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Learners observe working lava lamps to understand how they work (included in PDF link).
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Hot Air Balloon
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In this activity, learners build a hot air balloon using just a few sheets of tissue paper and a hair dryer.
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Toasty Wind
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In this quick activity, learners use a toaster to investigate the source for the Earth's wind. Learners hold a pinwheel above a toaster to discover that rising heat causes wind.
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Convection Current
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In this activity, learners make their own heat waves in an aquarium.
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The Amazing Water Trick
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Using two baby food jars, food coloring, and an index card, you'll 'marry' the jars to see how hot water and cold water mix.
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Pie-Pan Convection
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It's difficult to see convection currents in any liquid that's undergoing a temperature change, but in this Exploratorium Science Snack, you can see the currents with the help of food coloring.
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Full of Hot Air: Hot Air Balloon Building
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In this activity, learners create a model of a hot air balloon using tissue paper and a hairdryer. Educators can use this activity to introduce learners to density and its role in why things float.
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What Causes Pressure?
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In this kinesthetic activity that demonstrates pressure, learners act as air molecules in a "container" as defined by a rope.
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Energetic Water
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In this activity, learners explore how hot and cold water move. Learners observe that temperature and density affect how liquids rise and fall.
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Melting Ice
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In this activity, learners explore density, convection, stratification, and, by inference, the melting of icebergs. Learners make hypotheses, test their hypotheses, and explain their observations.
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Sinking Water
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In this experiment, learners float colored ice cubes in hot and cold water.
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Differing Densities: Fresh and Salt Water
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In this activity, learners visualize the differences in water density and relate this to the potential consequences of increased glacial melting.
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Convection Demonstration
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In this quick activity (located on page 2 of the PDF under GPS: Balloon Fiesta Activity), learners will see the effects of convection and understand what makes hot air balloons rise.
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That's the Way the Ball Bounces: Level 2
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In this activity, learners prepare four polymer elastomers and then compare their physical properties, such as texture, color, volume, density, and bounce height.
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Cooling Off
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In this activity, learners are introduced to challenges of maintaining temperatures while living in space.
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Fly a Hot-Air Balloon
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Learners assemble a hot-air balloon from tissue paper. The heated air (from a heat gun) inside the balloon is less dense than the surrounding air and causes the balloon to float.
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That Sinking Feeling
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In this quick activity, learners observe how salinity and temperature affect the density of water, to better understand the Great Ocean Conveyor.
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Inverted Bottles
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In this activity, learners investigate convection by using food coloring and water of different temperatures.
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Salt Crystal Garden
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In this activity, learners will explore saturated solutions and discover how crystals form.