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Unit 8: Chemistry Page 25

Activities, Experiments, Projects

Lesson 2: Chemical Kinetics

Note: This section is an abbreviated overview of the experiments online.

mixture (the cross-linking agent). You
Experiment: Glowing Slime
need both in order to create a slime
worthy of Hollywood filmmakers.
When you think of slime, do you imagine

slugs, snails, and puppy kisses? Or does
To make this slime, combine ½ cup of
the science fiction film The Blob come to
water with 1 teaspoon of sodium
mind? Any way you picture it, slime is
tetraborate (also known as ‘Borax’) in a
definitely slippery, slithery, and just plain
cup and stir with a popsicle stick.
icky — and a perfect forum for learning
real science. In another cup, mix equal parts white
glue and water. Add a glob of the glue
But which ingredients work in making a
mixture to the sodium tetraborate
truly slimy concoction, and why do they mixture. Stir for a second with a popsicle
work? Let’s take a closer look… stick, then quickly pull the putty out of

the cup and play with it until it dries
Imagine a plate of spaghetti. The
enough to bounce on the table (3 to 5
noodles slide around and don’t clump
minutes). Pick up an imprint from a
together, just like the long chains of
textured surface or print from a
molecules (called polymers) that make
newspaper, bounce and watch it stick,
up slime. They slide around without
snap it apart quickly and ooze it apart
getting tangled up. The pasta by itself
slowly …
(fresh from the boiling water) doesn’t
hold together until you put the sauce on.
To make glowing slime, add one simple
Slime works the same way. Long,
ingredient to make your slime glow
spaghetti-like chains of molecules don’t
under a UV light (or in sunlight)! You’ll
clump together until you add the sauce …
need to extract the dye from the felt of a
until you add something to cross-link the bright yellow highlighter pen and use the
molecule strands together. extract instead of water. (Simply cut

open the pen and let water trickle over
The sodium-tetraborate-and-water
the felt into a cup: instant glow juice.)
mixture is the “spaghetti” (the long chain
For the best slime results, substitute
of molecules, also known as a polymer),
clear glue or glue gel for the white glue.
and the “sauce” is the glue-water

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