ISEN-ASTC-L is a service of the Association of Science-Technology Centers
Incorporated, a worldwide network of science museums and related institutions.
*****************************************************************************

Dear colleagues,

Thank you for the overwhelming response to my request for ideas for science experiments. It was a great help, and I very much appreciate your sharing your ideas with me!

Somebody asked me about the mussel filtration experiment that I do, but unfortunately, I accidentally deleted that e-mail! Here's the description of the experiment:

Mussel filtration
I use a 20 liter glass tank with gravel at the bottom and about 40-80 blue mussels. All they really need is an air pump and, of course, sea water. I talk to the kids about mussels, how they filter plankton out of the water and are thus called filter feeders.

Then, I suspend a teaspoon of dry yeast in half a cup of tap water, and add it to the tank. This will make the water go cloudy. The kids and I then make a note of the time.

During the rest of the six-hour science workshop, we keep an eye on the tank. The water will gradually become clear because the mussels are filtering out the yeast. When we deem the water to be as clear as before we added the yeast, we not the time again and calculate how long it has taken them. Then, we talk about how mussel banks in the wild can have a large impact on sea water quality near the coast.

A lot more could be done with this experiment, such as calculating the volume of water that each mussel has filtered and applying that to the wild, but the workshop I run mainly has 7-8 year olds and I fear that would be going a little over their heads!

Good luck with this, and thanks for all the help,

Marianne

Education Officer
Galway Atlantaquaria

 		
---------------------------------

Alt i én. Få Yahoo! Mail med adressekartotek, kalender og notesblok. 

***********************************************************************
More information about the Informal Science Education Network and the
Association of Science-Technology Centers may be found at http://www.astc.org.
To remove your e-mail address from the ISEN-ASTC-L list, send the
message  SIGNOFF ISEN-ASTC-L in the BODY of a message to
[log in to unmask]