Registration | Log In

Search Grants | Fulfilled Grants | More About Find It, Fund It, Florida

Share

Please share this page to help in fulfilling this grant.

Goal

Students will learn how electricity can be used safely to make colorful jewelry by moving electrons in a chemical reaction. By adjusting the voltage, they can make various thicknesses of the niobium oxide coating which results in the appearance of different colored coatings. 

What will be done with my students

Students will be taught how to work with electricity safely while performing an oxidation-reduction reaction with the supervision of their chemistry instructor or a local chemistry professor.

Students will make and then take home a colorful niobium charm that bends light at different angles depending on the thickness of the oxide coating that they create using a variety of voltages on the voltmeter we purchased with Connect With A Classroom Grant two years ago. 

Benefits to my students

Students will experience first-hand how science, technology, engineering and mathematics can be used to create colorful jewelry (or fishing lures). They will be able to make and then take home a colorful niobium charm that bends light at different angles depending on the thickness of the oxide coating they create on the surface. This will be a talking point for them to discuss with family and friends what they learned in class during this electrochemistry unit.

We will also extend this experiment to discuss other real life chemical reactions that involve the exchange of electrons, such as biochemical reactions in their bodies, those that produce color in fireworks and those that produce energy in simple batteries. 

Budget Narrative

We have all the equipment and safety supplies to make niobium jewelry we just need more metal discs, loops and jump rings so that each student will be able to make one piece of jewelry to bring home. To clamp each ring completely shut, students will require 4 good pair of sturdy pliers. 

Items