Matter: class blog 1

Science. It has to do with everything. At the moment, our unit for science class is matter. In chemistry, we have mainly learned about matter, and anything that has to do with matter. Matter is anything that has mass and volume. All objects have matter because all objects have mass and volume. The only items that don’t have matter are light, sound, and electricity because they don’t have mass or volume. All matter has the general properties which are mass, weight, volume, and density. Mass is the amount of matter in an object. Weight is the measure of the force of attraction between objects due to gravity. Volume is the amount of space and object takes up. Density is the measurement of how much mass is contained in a given object (mass per unit volume). In matter, weight changes depending on how much gravity (force of attraction between all objects in the universe) there is in the area. If you go to the moon, your weight will change because there is no gravity there. But, on Earth, you weigh more because there is gravity here.

I believe learning about matter is interesting because one gets to see how scientists classify objects. I get to learn about what properties are used and how the properties apply to learning about an object. In addition, it was fun performing the experiment we did. Each group was given five liquids, and we had to figure out which one was the least dense, which one was the most dense, and everything in between. Then, using the information we obtained by figuring out the density of the liquids, we had to layer the liquids by putting the most dense liquid at the bottom and building our way to the top where the least dense liquid was. It was fun having this hands-on experience.

Some interesting facts:

1. There are three main states of matter: gas, liquid, and solid. Gases have low density, are easy to expand and compress, and they fill the whole container. Liquids have high density, are hard to expand and compress, and can take any shape. Solids also have high density and are hard to expand and compress. But, unlike liquids, solids have a rigid shape.

Source: Frostburg State University- General Chemistry Online
hyperlink: http://antoine.frostburg.edu/chem/senese/101/matter/

2. Elements can change from one physical state to another, but they do not really change. The molecules would remain the same. In other words, an object’s physical state can change, but that doesn’t effect the chemical state. The general properties of an object change when the object changes states, but the essential chemical structure does not change.

Source: Rader’s Chem4Kids
hyperlink: http://www.chem4kids.com/files/matter_intro.html

PICTUREs from: (click on image to enlarge)
hyperlink: http://thegreatwaterodyssey.com/images/soliqgas.gif