Science Buddies: "Ask an Expert"

hey. ive just received my kit yesterday and i am kind of completely lost of how to do the expirement for my science fair. its due december 1st .i am a visual learner so can somebody send me a video of how they did this prject or help me out. and those words used are kind of big for my vacabulary so i need somebody to break the steps down in an paraphased version. i would really appreciate it for some expert to help me out.

Hello abdulaahi,

I'm assuming that you are working on the project described here:

https://www.sciencebuddies.org/science- ... ml#summary

The basic idea here is to burn a small piece of food beneath a container of water. The burning food heats the water. You measure the water temperature before and after heating with the burning food. The water temperature change can be used to calculate the number of calories released from the burning food.

The procedure does involve quite a few steps. I suggest that you carefully read the background and procedure sections at the link listed above. Then make a couple of “dry runs” where you go through the procedure without burning anything. That should give you a better idea of how this works. And you can make sure that all the equipment works well in the procedure.

I hope this helps. Please post again if you have more questions.

A. Norman

heres another question its says its suppose to take 6-10 days.my teacher said it has to be atleast two weeks but thats close enough. so how do i get to make it atleast 10 days. it looks like it will only take one day to complete. can u help me out with that??



another thing do u have a video or something i can seee to visualize it or not//

Hi abdulaahi,

I think that the testing make take only a day or two to complete. But have you considered the time you might need to complete your background research, calculations, analysis of results and final report? All of those tasks are parts of your project. Completing them will take several days – maybe up to two weeks.

For more information on planning and conducting your project you might review the information at this link:

https://www.sciencebuddies.org/science- ... ndex.shtml


I did a quick internet search on “food calorimeter video” and found this link:

http://www.schooltube.com/video/d7e883f ... n-a-Peanut

This video shows a test procedure that is similar to the one described on the sciencebuddies site. One of the differences is that the video does not have the outer coffee can used to insulate the water and burning food.


I hope this helps. Good luck with your project and please post again if you have more questions.

A. Norman

It is always easy to add more time to a science project.

Run an additional trial. Each additional trial improves the accuracy of your conclusions. A very common weakness in science fair projects is running the test only once or twice. If you have time, it never hurts to try again and see if your results come out the same.

(if you run a test once, you could have introduced an error you do not know about. If you run a test twice, the difference in the results tells you something about how variable your test procedure is. Each additional trial that gives a similar result greatly increases confidence that your results are sound.

how do i properly weigh the item??

Hi abdulaahi,

For your project you will need to weigh each food item that you burn in your experiment. If you got the kit suggested for the project, you should have a balance for weighing the food items. If you don't have a balance, here is a link for one suggested in the project description:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000P1 ... B000P1NYE8

Proper use of this kind of “top loading” balance is easy. First, place a lightweight glass or plastic container on the top of the balance (the balance pan). When the weight display is constant, press the “tare” or “zero” button. The display should now read 0.00 grams. Use tweezers or tongs to pick up the food item you want to weigh and gently put the item into container on the balance pan. When the weight display is constant, write down the weight of the item.

Some tips for proper use of lab balances are outlined at this link:

http://www.csudh.edu/oliver/che230/labm ... ropuse.htm


I hope this helps. Please post again if you have more questions.

A. Norman