How To Teach Science During Breakfast… Soggy Cereal Science
So far, we have learned how cooking bacon and brewing coffee can be used to teach science during breakfast. Now it’s time to turn our attention towards another common early morning meal – cereal.
Before we do, let’s review the four basic concepts that can be used to teach science:
Now go grab a box of Cap’n Crunch or Cheerios and let’s get to work!
What’s going on with the atoms in your cereal?
First, you should know by now that everything within a bowl of cereal is made up of atoms. The bowl, spoon, milk, and cereal itself are all made up of atoms! Within each solid piece of cereal you may find billions of atoms, all vibrating against each other. That’s right! All atoms within a solid, even the ones that bind together to make Corn Flakes, are moving a little bit.
Of course, the atoms that are bound together to make up the liquid milk are moving around a lot faster. That is what happens in every liquid!
What does density have to do with all of this?
When you pour your milk over a bowl of cereal, does the cereal sink or float? It probably floats! But why?
Well, the amount of atoms that make up the cereal are not equal to the number of atoms within the milk inside the bowl. This means that the density of the cereal is less than the density of the milk. When you mix two objects together of different densities, the one with the lower density will float!
Quick!!! Eat your cereal before it gets soggy!
You can thank diffusion for the unfortunate (and soggy) end for those last few pieces of cereal in your bowl. This squishy transformation takes place when the huge amount of fast-moving atoms inside the milk slams through the slow-moving atoms within the cereal. Another way to say this is this: The atoms within the milk diffuse into the collection of atoms within the cereal.
And with all this milk being absorbed, it quickly increases the density of the cereal (so much so that it causes the cereal to sink to the bottom of the bowl as a spongy pile of goo.)
Now if you choose a more sugary cereal you may have a few more minutes until your bowl becomes filled with a dissolved gummy slime. Why? Well, it takes a little longer for the milk to diffuse into the cereal because it has to dissolve the sugary coating first.
That’s why your Cap’n Crunch will float on top of your milk a little longer than your Cheerios!
“Hey?!? What happened to my cereal?!?”
Remember the Law of Conservation – Atoms cannot be created or destroyed, only changed.
All those soggy chunks of cereal may sink to the bottom of the bowl, but they cannot disappear after soaking for awhile. They might break apart and change shape, but your soggy Corn Flakes will never lose a single atom!
Atoms, Density, Diffusion, and the Law of Conservation…
…all at the breakfast table!
Find out more about scientific concepts within the Classic Science Curriculum
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How to Teach Science During Breakfast: Soggy Cereal Science
So far, we have learned how cooking bacon and brewing coffee can be used to teach science during breakfast. Now it’s time to turn our attention towards another common early morning meal – cereal.
Before we do, let’s review four basic concepts that can be used to teach science:
