Home Science CommunicationOutreach & engagement Apple science in the classroom?

Apple science in the classroom?

by Eva Amsen

Behold, two slices of apple! I’m trying some apple science for a school visit, but it’s not going very well.

apple science

This apple had been cut an hour before the picture was taken, and the right half was rubbed with lemon juice. Sure, it’s less brown than the other half, but I’m preparing an experiment for kids, and it needs to be more spectacular than this! Would you be excited by this if you were eleven? I think not!
I enlisted the help of the people of Metafilter to find better browning apples, and will repeat the experiment with 3 different kinds of apples to find the biggest difference between unlemoned and lemoned.

Eventually, I will use the apples for a program for which volunteers will go to inner city schools to tell the kids there something about science. From previous outreach volunteering I know that many schools don’t allow food experiments, especially not the inner city schools, because a lot of the kids there don’t get enough to eat at home, and would be shocked to see that food wasted for a demonstration. But the lemoned half of the apple is perfectly edible after the experiment, and if nobody has a fruit allergy they could eat it afterwards as a snack. There’s nothing cooler than eating a science experiment!

So the plan is to set it up so it works, document the whole thing with pictures, make a protocol/explanation sheet for it, and then ask for permission to bring apples into schools.

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2 comments

Heather October 25, 2006 - 8:54 PM

Look what I saw today on the train!
It’s a bad photo, but you have the original. 🙂

Eva October 25, 2006 - 9:26 PM

Awesome, thanks!!

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