Now that we had evidence to suggest particles really were, we moved forward with representing our ideas no longer with particles, but instead with molecules. We had an awesome time building out various models of water as a start, and then moved towards understanding that different molecules are made of the same atoms but in different amounts, shapes and arrangements.
From here, we started to think about how our chemical reaction starts with baking soda, water, and citric acid, and ends up with carbon dioxide! Check out some students' thinking as they tried to model this!
And from here, we worked to really push for what a chemical reaction means, and how our reactant side of our chemical reaction must have the same atoms as the product side of our reaction! We've not only identified the mystery bath bomb gas, but we've figured out other products that included water and citric acid! Way to go 6th graders!