Clicking Quarter

Explore how air’s temperature makes things move in this simple and fun experiment for kids, clicking quarter. First, you must know that when air gets warmer, it expands (grows bigger) to fill more space. Let’s get started.

Check it out in action:

What you will need:

Quarter

Freezer

Water

Plastic Bottle

Journal

Pens

Result Timing: 12 minutes

What to do:

First, take the cap off the soda bottle and put the clean empty bottle in the freezer for ten minutes.
After ten minutes, wet the quarter with water.
Then take the bottle out of the freezer and set it on a table or counter.
Immediately cover the opening of the bottle with the quarter. In your journal write down what you see and hear.

How it works

After sitting in the freezer for 10 minutes the air in the bottle is now much cooler than the air in the room. When you take the bottle out of the freezer, the air inside it starts to get warmer, which means it also starts to expand or get bigger. Soon there’s not enough room in the bottle for the air, and it starts pushing on the quarter. The quarter clicks against the soda bottle each time the air pushes it out of the way. Withing a minute or two, enough air has escaped from the bottle that it no longer pushes the quarter out of the way and the clicking stops.

LET US KNOW!

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We would love to see you doing the experiments!