In this lesson students continue their learning about gas laws by learning Boyle's and Charles' laws. I introduce these by first going over the relationship between the variables and then having students solve problems algebraically.
For this lesson there are several resources needed:
1. For the cartesian divers I use 2L soda bottles, plastic pipettes, and nuts. You can also use ketchup packets for the divers.
2. For the Charles' law lab activity each group needs a 125mL Erlenmeyer flask, a 25mL graduated cylinder, a large balloon (12in), and a hot plate.
To engage students in the lesson I have them start to think about how pressure and volume are related by using Cartesian Divers.
This is the bulk of the lesson where I teach students about Boyle's and Charles' Laws. I teach them through going through slides 3-19 of the PowerPoint and students fill in answer on their Unit 7 lecture 2 student notes graphic organizer.
I start with Boyle's Law:
I then go into Charles' Law:
This is an example of one student's filled in notes.
For this section of the lesson students have time to continue to think about Charles' Law by performing an experiment. I introduce the experiment to students on the last slide of the PowerPoint . The experiment is found on the second part of the Activities paper.
1. I first introduce the activity to students and review that because we are using glassware and hotplates that they must wear their safety goggles.
2. I then have students go up to their lab stations with their table groups.
3. At each station students have a 125 mL Erlenmeyer flask, a bottle of water, a balloon, and a hot plate.
4. As students are working I walk around to ensure that they are on task and answering the accompanying questions.
Here is an example of a student's answers to the activity. Notice how this student is trying to also bring in the idea of pressure which makes this a little confusing. I was aiming to have students just think about temperature and volume as in this second example.
For the last section of this lesson I have students begin their homework.