GlassElectronic book published by ipicturebooks.com

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All rights reservedText copyright © 1999 Nicola Edwards and Jane HarrisPhotographs copyright © 1999 Julian Cornish-Trestrail

No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical,

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e-ISBN 1-59019-863-8Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available

ISBN 0-7136-5066-4

Exploring the scienceof everyday materials

Nicola Edwards andJane Harris

Photographs by

Julian Cornish-Trestrail

2

Glass is made in a factory.Lots of things are madeof glass.

We’ve collected all these!

3

Windows are made of glass, too!

4

This special, toughpiece of glass islike a window.

I can seeright through it.

The walls of thisbuilding aremade of glass.The glass letsa lot of lightthrough.

Mirrors are made of glass,

too.

6

I’ve found a glass marble.It feels round

and smooth and cool.

7

This at glass feelssmooth and hard.

Your nosehas gone all

squashy!

This paperweight ismade of thick glass.It feels heavy.

9

Look at this glass vase.The sides areso delicate.

10

Don‛t drop that!It‛ll smash into pieces.

I know – I‛m holding it very

carefully.Broken glass is

very sharp.

11

What will happen tothis marble if I drop it?

I know – I‛m holding it very

carefully.Broken glass is

very sharp.

It didn’t smash.I saw it bounce!

When glass is beingmade in a factory, it‛s very

hot and soft.It can be

turned into lots ofdifferent shapes.

13

But something that’s madeof glass doesn’t changeits shape.

Unless it gets broken or melted down

in a factory.

14

I’ve dropped some wateron to this piece of glass.

The water sits on top of the glass.It doesn’t soak through.

I wonder what will happen if I dropa marble into this tank of water.

It sinks tothe bottom.

Will all these thingsmade of glass sink too?

Let‛s try them out.

This magnifying glass makesthings look bigger.

I can see thingsbetter when I‛m

wearing my glasses.

17

Binoculars have magnifying glassesin them to make things look nearer.

How many ngers am Iholding up?

One…two…three…FOUR!

In my Gran‛s gardenthere‛s a greenhouse

made of glass. Gran growstomato plants and

owers in it.

19

In the summer, Gran lets me pick the tomatoes.

It feels hotinside the greenhouse.It‛s more comfortable

in the fresh air.

20

Glass can be beautiful.Look at this glassornament. It has been made to looklike a shell.

There are so many colours in this paperweight.

I can see blue, green, black and white.

22

Time to tidy away.

Let‛s sort theseout into clear, greenand brown glass for

the bottle bank.

23

We’ve collected allthese bottles and jarsfor recycling.

The glass can betaken back to a factory

to be melted downand used again.

24

The aim of the Science Explorers series is to introduce children to waysof observing and classifying materials, so that they can discover thevarious properties which make them suitable for a range of uses.By talking about what they already know about materials from theireveryday use of different objects, the children will gain con dencein making predictions about how a material will behave in differentcircumstances. Through their explorations, the children will be ableto try out their ideas in a fair test.

Notes for parents and teachers

pp 2/3, 4/5, 12/13

Glass is cheap to make from a mixture of (mostly)sand, soda ash and limestone with scrap glass (calledcullet) added and heated in a furnace. Molten glasscan be manipulated into a range of forms, from sheetsof ‘ oat glass’ used for windows, to the threads ofglass, ner than a single human hair, which are used inthe telecommunications industry.

Ask the children to think of everyday things which aremade from glass. How would those things be differentif they were made from other materials? You couldtake the children on a ‘materials walk’, linking the usesof different materials to their various properties.

Introduce the children to objects they may not havethought of as having glass components, such asjewellery, cameras, mirrors, telescopes, computers andtelevisions and breglass canoes, shing rods and crashhelmets.

pp 6/11

Provide the children with a range of objects which aremade of, or which contain glass, stressing theimportance of careful handling. Ask the children to

describe how the glass objects look and feel. Recordtheir responses and discuss them. Were anydescriptive words used more than others?

Have the children ever seen broken glass at home, oron the street? Discuss how best to respond safely in asituation when glass is broken.

You could talk about the amazing contrastingproperties of glass. Toughened glass can be madestrong enough to be bullet-proof and glass can bemade so thin and fragile that it is capable of beingshattered by the sound of a sustained, high-pitchednote.

pp 14/15

Glass is particularly useful for kitchen (and laboratory)equipment because it is easy to keep clean, it doesn’tdeteriorate and it resists contamination.

The children’s experiments with glass objects andwater also provide an opportunity for them to beginto explore capacity. Ask them to compare different-shaped jars and bottles; which will hold the mostwater? How will they measure the amounts fairly? Thechildren could record their results.

25

pp 16/17

Glass can be ground and polished to make curvedsurfaces called lenses. Lenses bend light to makeobjects appear clearer or larger to the eye.

The children could go on a ‘nature walk’, exploringhow magnifying lenses allow them to see things inmore detail. Make sure that the children are awarethat they should never look directly at the sun withthe naked eye, let alone through any lens.

pp l8/l9

Have any of the children been inside a greenhouse?Discuss (and if possible visit) the huge greenhouseswhich are used in garden centres and botanicalgardens to cultivate plants in re-creations of tropicaltemperatures.

pp 20/21

The plasticity of glass when it’s hot means it can bemade into beautiful sculptures and ornaments. Someglass sculptures may perform a function (e.g. as tablesand chairs) as well being works of art.

The National Glass Centre in Sunderland (0191 5155555) houses exhibitions covering the history of glass-making to the present day as well as studios withglassmakers giving demonstrations of their work.

pp 22/23

Discuss the importance of recycling glass with the chil-dren and if possible, take them to see a bottle bank,making a collection of recyclable bottles and glasscontainers before you go. Why do they think thebottle bank is divided into clear, green and brownglass?

Find the pageHere is a list of some of thewords and ideas in this book

binoculars 17

broken glass 10, 13

coloured glass 21

describing glass 4, 6, 7, 8, 9, 12, 13, 14

glass buildings 5, 18, 19

magnifying glass 16

making glass 12

marbles 6, 11, 15

mirrors 5

objects made from glass 2, 3, 15, 20

recycling glass 22, 23

water 14, 15

windows 3, 4