Activity 2.4 - Which effects can acids have on different materials and on our health? – Non-desirable effects

Learning Aims:

Students learn to explain the functionality of acids based on their chemical structure and reactions.
Materials:
Experiment: see classroom material, choose some or all experiments from Activity 2.4
Suggestions for use:

The experiments show how acids react with different substances, such as bone, meat, marble or metals.

For Activity 2.4.5:

  • In the first research activity, students will check out companies (by a real or virtual visit or descriptions found online) and their treatment of acidic waste. Here, they might already find out about both neutralization and dilution as two options to decrease the concentration of acid in a solution.
  • In the second part, students will themselves perform a neutralization and/or dilution. In both cases, the step-by-step change in acid concentration can be both measured and tracked by using pH-meters, for example, and/or calculated to visualize the change in acid concentration. In this activity, it would be nice to use acidic household cleaners, as they are the starting points of the students’ inquiry; a transfer to other acids used in the laboratory is also possible, however.
Source:

Freienberg, J. & Flint, A. "Chemie fürs Leben - am Beispiel von Zitronensaft und 'Rohrfrei'; eine alltags- und schülerorientierte Unterrichtseinheit zum Thema Säuren, Laugen und Salze im Chemieunterricht der Sekundarstufe I." University of Rostock, pdf (in German) accessible at:

http://sinus-transfer.uni-bayreuth.de/fileadmin/MaterialienBT/Skript_Flint.pdf