Adv Science

Summary:  During this week, some of the groups in my class taught us on different topics. Two of my classmates decided to teach us about black holes, which I found very interesting. I learned that if you entered a black hole and became spaghettified, you would really just become a long string of atoms. (So really more clarification on spaghettification.) I also learned that virtually anything could become a black hole if it were compressed to a small enough size. I also learned that there were four different types of black holes. Another thing I learned about black holes were the three main parts of a black hole: the singularity point, the ergosphere, and the event horizon. SP1: Asking questions and defining problems.  I asked questions such as, "If a black hole were to replace our sun, how would the solar system continue functioning?" and "Assuming there is a black hole in the center of the Milky Way, and assuming there is a black hole in the center of An

Summary:  During this week, I reviewed element reactions for my science final project. Our final project requires that we have an interactive "element" (haha see what I did there?) so the rest of the class can be more engaged with the lesson. So for our interactive, we're going with the elephant toothpaste. While researching how the elephant toothpaste works, I learned that in the kid-friendly version, yeast acts a catalyst and the bubbles in the foam from the experiment are a remainder of when the hydrogen peroxide breaks into the water and oxygen. The catalyst is the same when the yeast is swapped out for sodium iodide. I learned that the catalyst is used to speed up the reaction. I also learned that the elephant toothpaste/exploding toothpaste creates an exothermic reaction, meaning the result will give off heat. This is why in the adult version of elephant toothpaste, it is recommended not to touch the foam. (And also because most adult versions use 30% hy

Summary:  During this week, I learned about stress. I learned that when you're stressed out, your brain releases a chemical called cortisol. I also learned that too much stress can cause the hippocampus and your frontal lobe to shrink. This means that nerve connections can be destroyed, which causes heart failure. (Because nerve signals aren't reaching the heart, so the heart stops pumping blood.) SP1: Asking questions and defining problems.  I asked questions such as, "Who named stress?" and "If one stresses about a specific thing, will that thing be worked into their dreams because they worried about it so much?"  Image Link:  Two blood cells met and fell in love... Alas, it was all in vein.

Summary:  During this week, I reviewed scientific material from 6th to 8th Grade for the California state-certified science test. I remembered (or rather, learned again), that ions are formed when an atom loses or gains electrons.  SP1: Asking questions and defining problems.  I asked questions such as, "Why are comets and asteroids discovered when they are far from our sun?" and "What is the density of a black hole?" I asked other question such as, "Will the universe go back to nothing? Will that event be called the Big Crunch?" Image Link:  Why can't you ever trust atoms? Because they make up everything.  

Summary:  During this week, I learned... nothing again. We went over the different types of galaxies, such as spiral galaxies, elliptical galaxies, peculiar galaxies, and irregular galaxies. (The galaxy shown is the Sombrero Galaxy and is a spiral galaxy.) I know that spiral galaxies have spiraling arms, hence the name spiral galaxy. I also know that the Milky Way is a spiral galaxy and the Andromeda galaxy is also a spiral galaxy and is nearly like the Milky Way except that it has many more stars. SP1: Asking questions and defining problems.  I asked questions such as, "Why are comets and asteroids discovered when they are far from our sun?" and "What is the density of a black hole?" I asked other question such as, "Will the universe go back to nothing? Will that event be called the Big Crunch?" Image Link:  A neutrino walks into a bar... and keeps going.  

Summary:  During this week, I learned... nothing really. I already knew the phases of the moon and I knew the life cycle of a star. So... I'm just going to review what I already know: a star starts out as a cloud of dust and gas. It uses a process called nuclear fusion to help it stay bright for hundreds of years. It is noted that smaller stars tend to live longer than bigger stars because bigger stars burn themselves up too soon (literally). When it comes down to its last bit of energy, it becomes a red giant. Then it becomes a planetary nebula, which is when the outer layers are shed away. Then it becomes a white dwarf, and if it uses all its fuel, it could become a black hole. Stars that have giant explosions are called supernovas.  SP1: Asking questions and defining problems.  I asked scientific questions such as, "How does dark matter interact with stars?" and "Will Andromeda eat up the Milky Way?" (Andromeda is a bordering galaxy that get

DIY Instrument - Project Blog Post Summary:  This project was when we had to create an original instrument using our knowledge of sound. Our instrument had to be able to play three notes. While completing the labs for this project and annotating notes, I learned that a wave has several parts to it, such as the trough and crest. I learned that the crest is the highest part of a sound wave and that when sound waves are compressed, they create a higher pitch compared to sound waves that are less compressed.  Backward-Looking: What process did you go to produce this piece? I went through a long, slightly aggravating process to produce this piece. We did a couple of labs (I actually missed out on one...) to help boost our understanding of the topic, but from having learned about sound last year (with the added bonus of being in band!) I didn't struggle too much with figuring out how I was going to incorporate percussion, wind, and string into my instrument.  Inward-Look

Summary:  During this week, I learned about electromagnetic and mechanical waves. I learned that a mechanical wave needs a medium to pass through. I learned that an  electromagnetic wave didn't need a medium to pass through--since radiowaves are electromagnetic waves, they can pass through space easily. I also learned that the trough was the lowest point of the wave and that the smaller a wave was, the higher the frequency would be. I learned that a frequency measured how many waves passed in one second. SP1: Asking questions and defining problems.  I asked questions such as "How would people measure radiation waves?" and "How would people identify a surface wave." I also asked questions such as "Are there any special devices to measure different waves?" Image Link:  What did the beach say to the wave? "Long tide, no sea."  

Summary:  During this week, I learned that if you hit an object against a hard surface and stick it in a glass of water, it will actually cause the water to jump. Another thing that I learned was that when the ear detects sound waves, there are tiny hairs inside of the ear past the eardrum that turn the waves into vibrations, which nerves send to brain, and the brain analyzes that as sound. I also learned that there are three tiny bones inside of the ear that help pass along the vibrations. SP3: Planning and carrying out investigations.  I carried out investigations when I completed a lab involving tuning forks, ping pong balls, and a cup of water. I tested things over and over again and revised my thoughts when I found that you had to hit a tuning fork in a specific area for it to vibrate enough to get the water to jump out of the cup. Image Link:  What do you get when you drop a piano down a mineshaft? A flat miner.  

Summary:  During this week, I learned that sound travels 18 times faster through solids than through air. Another thing I learned was that when you hit a glass bottle filled with water, a solid sound is produced (meaning that is it not wispy, like a flute sound) because the object hit the glass, causing it to vibrate, which causes the water to vibrate, and the water causes the air to vibrate. The sound is sharp at first and then becomes quelled because it travels a little bit more slowly through the water and then even slower through the air. SP1: Asking questions and defining problems.  I asked questions such as, "How could one produce a sound that mirrors guitar strings?" and "How would you be able to tune an instrument to make it go back to its natural state-- would you push in to make it sharp/flat, or push out to make it sharp/flat?" Image Link:  I had to make these bad chemistry jokes because all the good ones Argon.  

Science WAC - Music in a Classroom: Is it a Distraction or a  Study Tool ?        “When good music hits you, you feel no pain,” said Bob Marley. Many would have agreed while others would argue that music serves as a distraction. I stand with a foot in each world-- it really just depends on what kind of music. I believe that music can help you study if you don’t turn it up incredibly loud and if it’s the kind of music that’s purely instrumental-- without words. But at the same time, I believe that music is only a distraction-- the amount of times I’ve tried to write something and listen to music at the same time and failed because I ended up writing the words into a document, then had to go back and delete them. To help you study, music should be turned at a low volume and should not contain words to confuse you. Since I listen to a variety of music, I’ve learned to choose music with simple tones rather than an onslaught of confusing melodies. However, I lean towards the

Roller Coaster - Project Blog Post Summary:  This project was when we had to create a prototype of a roller coaster and use a marble as the car. The objective of the roller coaster project was to learn about physics and to make sure we could design a roller coaster in which the marble would stay on the track.  Backward-Looking: How much did you know about the subject before we started? I knew only a little bit-- I knew what scalar and vector quantities were, and who discovered gravity, but aside from that, I didn't know about anything else.  Inward-Looking: How do you feel about this piece of work? What parts of it do you particularly like/dislike? Why? What did/do you enjoy about this piece/work?  I disliked this piece of work. I felt like it didn't represent my best work and I never believed it would actually work because the marble would always fall off the track. It was too messy because of all the tape we used to make our track smoother and because we had to

Summary:  During this week, I learned that our marble accelerated faster when we lined our pipes with tape to give it a smoother surface. (This was for our roller coaster project.) I also learned that our marble needed a lot of acceleration to go around the loop-the-loop fully or else it would fall off. Another thing I learned was that if our marble had too much acceleration or wasn't balanced properly on the top of our coaster, it would shoot out of the side before going all the way around our loop-the-loop. SP1: Asking questions and defining problems.  I asked questions such as, "What would happen if our marble had too much acceleration?" (Which was then tested...) And other questions such as, "How would applying tape to our pipes work?" and "Would hot glue work when trying to slow down our marble? What if the heat from the hot glue melts the styrofoam when applying it?" Image Link:  A photon checks into a hotel. The bellhop asks, “

Summary:  During this week, I learned about Newton's Laws of Motion. I learned that Newton's Law of Inertia meant that bodies in motion tend to stay in motion and bodies at rest to stay at rest. I also learned about his other two laws-- Newton's 2nd Law states that the acceleration of an object depends on the net force acting upon the object and the mass of the object. I also learned that Newton's Third Law of Motion states that every action has an equal and opposite reaction. SP3: Planning and carrying out investigations.  I investigated Newton's laws a little bit more with our Newton's Laws lab. I worked on his second law with a partner and found that the larger marble of our lab ended up going a little slower than our smaller marble because the big marble had less force behind it, while the small marble had the force from the big marble that propelled it forward over the tape.    Image Link:  What is a physicist’s favourite food? Fission chips

Summary:  During this week, I learned about kinetic and potential energy. I learned that potential energy is an energy stored within an object while kinetic energy is created while the body who possesses the energy is in motion. I also learned that potential and kinetic energy cannot be formed from nothing and cannot disappear into nothing. I learned some formulas on how to calculate kinetic energy (KE) and potential energy (PE). I also learned that when calculating kinetic energy, you have to multiply the gravitational pull. SP1: Asking questions and defining problems.  I asked questions and defined problems such as: "If you were on a different planet and were producing kinetic energy, how would you measure that if you didn't know the planet's gravitational pull?" and "How does your distance away from the sun and the planet's gravitational pull affect how much kinetic energy you're producing?"    Image Link:  Why did Erwin Schrödinge

Summary:  During this week, I learned nothing in class, since I'd fallen ill for most of the week. However, I did manage to educate myself on the common cold-- I learned that the common cold is caused by several different viruses and primarily targets the nose. I also learned that some people can experience pain in their muscles and can have swollen lymph nodes.  SP1: Asking questions and defining problems.  I asked questions and defined problems such as: "When you sneeze, does that also irritate the throat along with the effects of coughing?" I defined problems such as: "If I'm not at school today, how will I communicate with my team mates, especially if they can't use their phones? How will I catch up on my school work if I don't know what we're doing in class?"    Image Link:  A Higgs Boson walks into a church. The priest says, “We don’t allow Higgs Bosons in here. The particle responds by saying: “But without me, how can you h

Summary:  During this week, I learned about acceleration and completed my speed & velocity review sheet. I also learned the formula for calculating acceleration, which was velocity (final) subtract velocity (initial) divided by the time.  SP3: Planning and carrying out investigations.  I planned and carried out investigations when my team and I attempted to complete our acceleration lab. I also acknowledged questions to be tested when I asked, "How will positioning our track on the textbook--" (we were using Hot Wheels as our lab...) "--affect our distance on the meter stick? Will positioning the start of the track close to the edge of the textbook put more stress on the track on the ground, causing it to dip slightly, and thus creating a slightly steeper ramp, cause our car to go faster? Or will it stop towards the middle of the ramp because of car's weight?"    Image Link:  How many theoretical physicists specializing in general relativity