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Dressing For Outdoors
Preparatory Activities
| Planning Checklist
This activity challenges the students to keep a “mouse” as
warm as possible in an indoor environment.
- Introduce the students to the word insulation. Insulation is a material
that does not conduct heat or cold well. Most of our cool weather clothing
uses insulating materials such as down, fur, wool or synthetic materials.
- Give each student or pair of students a clean, empty film canister
with a tight fitting lid. Tell the students that the canister will soon
be filled with hot water; this will be their “mouse”.
- Challenge the students to make or find an insulator that will keep
the “mouse” warmer than another “mouse” in the room.
- Display a variety of insulating materials available to the students:
wool, nylon, cotton, styrofoam, dish washing scrubbies, socks etc. You
may wish to include items from the school’s lost and found such
as scarves and mitts. Have tape, pins, twine and other fastening materials
also available.
- Have the students make an insulating jacket for their canister. Then
fill all the canisters with hot water from the tap and distribute to
the students, reminding them that their “mice” are rapidly
cooling down!
- Have the students record the water temperature and then quickly place
their “mice” in their insulating jackets. The labeled canisters
should then all be placed on the same table in the classroom.
- Have the students measure the water temperature every 10-15 minutes
over a two hour period, recording both time and temperature.
- Have the students plot their data on a piece of graph paper, along
with the results from 3 or 4 other students who used different materials
for the jackets.
- The following questions will provide a good start for discussion and
conclusions:
- Based on your graph, who made the best insulator?
- Why do you think it worked so well?
- Which materials make the best insulator?
- Which materials make the poorest insulator? How could you improve
your “mouse” insulator next time?
- What conclusions can you draw about clothing selection for cool
weather?
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