Explore and describe the densities of various materials through measurement of their masses and volumes.
| Name |
Description |
| What Floats Your Boat | Students will solve real-world and mathematical problems involving density. Students will engineer solutions to the given problem using gained scientific content knowledge as application of mathematical skills |
| Stay Afloat in Water | In this lesson, students will explore the physical characteristics of various liquids, including mass, volume, and density. They will perform a lab and analyze data to determine how liquids with different densities interact in a graduated cylinder. |
| Slope Intercept - Lesson #1 | This is lesson 1 of 3 in the Slope Intercept unit. This lesson introduces graphing proportional relationships. In this lesson students will perform an experiment to find and relate density of two different materials to the constant of proportionality and unit rate. |
| Knight Shipping, Inc. | In this design challenge students will take what they have learned about calculating the volumes and densities of cones, cylinders, and spheres, to decide which shape would make the best shipping container. Students will calculate the volumes and densities to help select the best design and then test them to move at least 3 containers of the chosen shape across the classroom. Students will fill the shapes with marshmallows to visually confirm which shape would hold more. |
| Scout Robot: Mass, Density, Volume, Weight | In this MEA, students must select which material to use in the development of an advanced military scout robot. Students must analyze data about each material’s individual properties that would make it a valid choice for military or police service. Students must complete calculations to determine material density as well as the overall mass and weight of the robot. This lesson focuses on the characteristic properties of density, unit conversion, and differentiating between mass and weight.
Model Eliciting Activities, MEAs, are open-ended, interdisciplinary problem-solving activities that are meant to reveal students’ thinking about the concepts embedded in realistic situations. Click here to learn more about MEAs and how they can transform your classroom. |
| Pennies For Thought | Through this two day lesson, students will learn the concepts of weight, mass, volume, and density, and be able to accurately measure them and understand the relationship between them. They will also be able to calculate a substance's density by taking two points on a graph and applying the rise/run equation.
Day one will include a pre-test to access prior knowledge on the concepts of weight, mass, volume and density. Direct instruction of their definitions along with practice measuring these four properties will be provided in the form of interactive centers.
The hook for day two will be a class demonstration. (You will need a balance, and 50 pennies divided into two separate piles: 25 pennies from the year 1981 and earlier and the other 25 newer than 1982.) The pennies will be measured by placing a penny from each pile on the balance until all the pennies have been placed on the balance; students will observe that as you add more pennies to each side, it becomes unbalanced. Discuss how it is possible to have two equal volumes of pennies be unbalanced using their knowledge of weight, mass, volume and density from the day before.
For the remainder of class, have them explore the relationship between mass, volume and density by measuring and graphing their two sets of pennies. By creating a double line graph of their volume and mass, they will discover that their densities (indicated by the slope in their graph) are different. And that by taking the points on their graph and applying the rise/run equation they can obtain the density of each group of pennies.
To provide enrichment for those that are ready to take it a step further, have them research and compare densities of commonly used metals to discover what their two groups of pennies were composed of and what change was made in 1982 to change the density of the pennies. |
| Density Cube Lab | Students will find the density of cubes made from different substances and determine if they sink or float. |
| Rainbow Density Lab | Students make salt water solutions varying in density to create a rainbow in a 10 mL graduated cylinder. Students apply their knowledge of solutes, solvents, solutions, and the properties of density. |
| Density Dilemma | This lesson is about density and its relationship to sinking and floating. First, previous knowledge will be assessed through a measuring activity of mass, volume, and density. Next, the topic of sinking and floating will be addressed and how they relate to density. Finally, students will undergo an independent activity where they will figure out how to make one object sink, one object float, and one object stay suspended in a liquid. Overall, this lesson contains 4 activities and 2 video clips. It can require 3 or 4 days to complete. |
| Crime Scene Density Lab | Students will learn about the practical application of density measurement in the context of conducting a crime scene investigation of a break-in at the school. |
| Density of Solids and Liquids | In this Lab, students create their own definition for the term density and calculate the densities of different substances- solids and liquids. Students will learn that every substance has its own unique density, depending on how tightly atoms or molecules of the materials are packed. Students gather data about known samples to infer the identity of an unknown sample.
Note: This lesson will only cover the density portion of benchmark SC.8.P.8.4 |
| Why do things float in water? | In this lesson, the concept of density is effectively integrated into a lab. The students will understand why certain objects float in water and why others sink. This lesson requires the students to cooperatively work in groups, make predictions, examine data trends, and relate their understanding to real world objects. |
| What's Your Calculator Lid's Maximum Floating Load? | Students explore and describe the masses, volumes, and densities of various liquids and solid objects while mastering measuring techniques using various apparatuses. |
| What does it mean to be dense? | Students will use card stock patterns to create two mini-boxes that they can fill with three different substances. The density of each substance will be compared when contained in both the smaller and larger boxes. Students will use their observations to develop an argument describing how the change in volume of the box affected the density of the substance.
SC.8.P.8.4 will not be completely covered; only the physical property of density will be addressed. |
| Discovering Density | Students observe the effects of density on flotation and develop an understanding of density as the amount mass per unit volume through discussion and experimentation. Students also work in groups to design an experiment to determine the densities of several irregularly shaped objects and use data to support a conclusion about the buoyancy of each object. |
| Discovering Density | In this lesson students will be asked to measure the volumes and masses of objects to determine their densities. Along the way students are expected to gain a greater understanding of the concept of density and the fact that it is a property of a material independent of an objects shape or volume. |
| Calculating a Mineral's Density | Students will use the Density=Mass/Volume formula to calculate the density of an unknown mineral. By using water displacement and a triple beam balance students will collect measurements of volume and mass for an unknown mineral. With this data, they will calculate the mineral's density then identify the mineral based on calculated density. |
| Constructing and Calibrating a Hydrometer | Students construct and calibrate a simple hydrometer using different salt solutions. They then graph their data and determine the density and salinity of an unknown solution using their hydrometer and graphical analysis. |
| Density – a relationship of mass and volume | Students will be able to describe density and compare the densities of various materials using their masses and volumes.
Content statements:
- Density is the amount of matter filling the object's space.
- Adding mass to an object without changing its volume, increases the object's density.
- Objects that have a large mass and small volume have a high density.
- Objects that have a small mass and a large volume have a low density.
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| Density: A relationship of mass and volume using liquids | Students will be able to compare and calculate the densities of various materials using their masses and volumes.
Content statements:
- Objects with the same mass but different volumes have different densities.
- Objects with different masses but the same volume have different densities.
- Liquids with different densities can be layered. |
| Name |
Description |
| Now That is a Dense Graph | Students will first measure and plot the total mass vs liquid volume in a graduated cylinder. They will then use slope and the mathematical formula for the plot to determine the density of the liquid, the density of a solid added to the liquid, and the mass of the graduated cylinder. |
| Pump Up the Volume | This activity is a statistical analysis of recorded measurements of a single value - in this case, a partially filled graduated cylinder. |
| Now That is a Dense Graph | In this activity, the density of ethanol is found by graphical means. In the second part, the density of sodium thiosulfate is found, also by graphical means. The values found are then analyzed statistically. |
| Echolocation and Density-SeaWorld Classroom Activity | Students will solve density problems. |
| Density of Solid Objects | A series of straightforward simulations offers students a variety of ways to explore the concepts of mass, volume, and density. Students see that objects of the same mass may not have the same volume, objects of the same volume may not have the same mass, objects having a density greater than that of water sink in water, and the density of a floating object determines the position of the object in a tank of water. |
