Socrates Fellows Our Projects Physics Under Pressure
Nathan Samuels (11th grade chem teacher) and Rosa Leon (grad student marine biology) are working at Mount Miguel High School. We concentrate on getting our students excited with science and making science more of an everyday life subject. Our main project has been to explore the relationship between the depth of the ocean and pressure.
This activity promotes the exploration of pressure as an important parameter of natural systems like the ocean. Divided in three small activities, students will be able to understand how pressure changes with depth in the deep sea. The first activity is an introductory exploration that involves a 5 gallon bucket filled with water, where student will introduce their hands and will explain what they feel and how that relates to pressure and the ocean. The second activity promotes the further exploration of pressure and depth by using a 2L soda bottle filled with water with two vertically aligned holes a few inches apart. Lastly the students will be asked to draw an organism on a Styrofoam stripe which will be pressurized to resemble two different depths of the sea. Students will be able to assess what happens to their organism and compare them to the rest of the class.
