100 Days of Science #57-- Which Has More Water Ice or Snow?

We had a bit of snow a few weeks ago and I was looking for a nice and easy science experiment to do with the boys.  

We have dome a few snow recipes over the years and I wanted something new.  We finally settled on discovering which had more water; a jar of snow or a jar of ice.  

We picked two mason jars that were the exact same size.  

We packed one as full of snow as we could and another full of whole sized ice cubes.  

I had the boys make predictions about which jar they thought they would melt first and which jar they thought would have the most water in it at the end.  We wrote down their predictions and set the jars aside; making sure to check on them every couple of hours.

The jar with the snow began melting first; much faster than the jar of ice.

It melted completely and we could already tell; even with large pieces of ice left that the jar of snow had far less water.

Ian has predicted that the snow would have less water since he watches a lot of survival shows and they often talk of how little water is in snow.  The other two boys had predicted that since more snow fits in a jar the snow would have more water.

We talked about how molecules in ice are tightly packed together in each cube but how snow crystals are spread out with lots of air between the molecules.  All that air takes up space and results in very little water. 

Others in this series:

1.  Bernoulli's Principle

2.  Field Trip to the Ecotarium 

3.  Learning About Air Molecules

4.  Kitchen Science; Baking cupcakes

5.  Corn Maze Field Trip 

6.  Birds of Florida 

7.  Static foil drum

8.  Un-Make it Monday; Seeing Inside our DVD/VCR player

9. Wind Tunnel Experiment 

10. Biomes Marine Biology Center Field Trip  

11. Disappearing Coin Trick and the Science Behind it. 

12.  Snuff Out a Candle with Baking Soda and Vinegar

13.  Making Plastic from Milk

14.  Pencil in the Rice Friction Experiment

15 & 16.  Two Experiments using SNOW

17.  Making an Iceberg 

18.  Making an Egg Float

19.  Looking at Microscopic Organisms 

20.  Eco Plant pals

21&22.  Two Experiments with Cotton Candy

23. Springfield Science Museum Trip

24.  Teaching Children the Signs of Spring

25.  Color Changing Slime

26.  Growing Tickle Me Plants

27.  Learning About Soil Sampling

28.  Making Super Bouncy Balls 

29. Exploring the New England Shoreline

30.  Color Changing Flower Experiment 

31.  Roger Williams Zoo Trip

32.  Edible Silly Putty 

33.  Raising Tadpoles

34. More Microscope Fun

35. Making Homemade Ice Cream

36.  Observing Plants Breathe 

37.  Trip to Save the Bay Exploration Center and Aquarium

38. Making Fresh Peach Preserves 

39.  Making Solar S'mores

40.  Growing a Crystal Garden

41 & 42.  Jolly Rancher Candy Apples and Lollipops

43.  Volcanic Lemons 

44.  Oozing Pumpkins 

45.  Growing a Germ Farm

46.  Looking at the Germ Farm Under a Microscope

47 & 48.  Building Model Molecules Two Ways 

49.  Kitchen Chemistry Experiments 

50.  Fall Leaf Chromatography 

51.  Color Changing Experiments with Iodine

52.  Learning About Birds in Winter

53. Iodine and Starch Experiment
54. Flouride and Calcium Experiment
55. Botanical Gardens in Winter
56.  Making Cell Models

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