100 Days of Science #14-- The Sword in the Stone!

We learned a lot about friction doing what we dubbed our Sword in the Stone science activity.   We experimented with taking a cooking skewer (or pencil) out of a bottle filled with rice.  

We gathered our supplies together:

an empty, disposable water bottle

dried rice (enough to fill the bottle)

a wooden skewer 

a pencil

a funnel

We began by just putting a bit of rice in the bottle and then pushed the wooden skewer all the way down into the bottom of the bottle.  

We easily pulled the skewer out since there was not enough friction to keep the skewer down.  We then added even more rice and tried again.

Once our bottle was filled to the top we tried one more time with the skewer but our wooden skewer was so thin that it easily came out yet again.

I decided to take a pencil and try the experiment over again... the pencil worked like a charm and the force of all the rice pushing in on the pencil allowed us to pick the bottle right up off the table without the pencil slipping or moving at all!

No matter how high we lifted it! 

Everyone tried and no one could get the" sword" of out of our "stone"

As we kept filling our bottle we did tap it on the table to make sure the rice settled in and we fit as much rice as we could in it.  As we had the rice settle in we increased the friction the rice would have on the pencil.

Others in this series:

1. Bernoulli's Principle
2. Ecotarium Trip 
3. Air Molecule Experiment
4. Kitchen Science
5. Corn Maze Field Trip 
6. Birds of Florida 
7. Making Static Music
8. Un-Make It Monday
9. Wind Tunnel Experiment
10. Biomes Field Trip
11. Disappearing Coin Trip
12. Snuffing out a Candle With Baking Soda
13. Making Plastic from Milk

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
57. Which Has More Water; Ice or Snow?
58. Exploding Snow and Water Baggies
59.  Exploring Minerals
60. Visiting the Hartford Science Museum
61-63. 3 STEM Bridge Challenges
64. Making Models of the Earth
65. Plate Techtonics with Graham Crackers
66.  Homemade Lava Lamp
67.  Science Movies We're Watching
68. Index Card Towers
69.  Botany at the Botanical Gardens
70. Best Board Games for Science 
71. Homemade Frozen Yogurt Pops
72.  Starburst Rock Cycle 
73. & 74. Sinking a Marshmallow
75. Jumping Conversation Hearts 
76-78. Building a Paper Airplane 3 Ways 
79. Learning About Hummingbirds 
80.  Planting an Herb Garden 
81. Mushroom Spores 
82. - 84.  Penny Saturation Experiments 
85. Sink or Float?
86. Disappearing Ink 
87. Sedment Layer Jars
88. Tie Dye Science 
89-91. DNA Experiments 
92.  Homemade Butter 
93. Floating Marker Art 
94. & 95. Oil Spills & Water Filtration 
96.- 98. Making Rock Candy & Rock Candy Experiments 
99. Rocket Science 

100. Permaculture Garden Tour