Periodic Table of Elements Unit Study

We started out grade 7 by diving into the Periodic Table of Elements for chemistry. I blocked off all of September for this unit study. In the past, chemistry has not been a household favorite, but this unit was definitely a success.

If you want to simply browse the resources you can find them here.

Unit Introduction

Something new I wanted to try this year was making displays on the wall to help draw in the learning and get the kids excited. I found a printable periodic table online and printed it out to build a display across our wall. It was a labor of love cutting out all of the elements and taping them in order, but the kids spent so much time looking over everything throughout the month.

I grabbed the periodic table cards from here. Scroll down to look for "Element Cards" to download the zip file (you will need to download this on a computer, aka the big internet, to unzip the folder of files). I only printed the pages that have the pictures of the elements and not the written information, since I was taping them to my wall.

Week 1

We started out with a refresher on what an atom is.  I have a couple of resource options on Teachers Pay Teachers if you need something to use. One is a print-and-go mini unit and the other is a digital student-led mini unit.

The kids also had fun with this hands-on activity to understand how small atoms are.

Then we moved on to exploring the periodic table on our wall. I asked them different questions for them to hunt and find the answers. They also noticed the different colored backgrounds and we talked about how the periodic table is sorted. 

A fun hands-on activity to get them understanding how things can be sorted in different ways, see the periodic aliens activity below.

We also watched this great TedEd talk talking about how it is sorted.

I assigned them with a project of their choice which I listed below. They both opted to turn their element into a superhero. Well, one of them chose arsenic and made it a villain. Then they matched their projects up in the end to see who would win during a battle.

Advertisement

Create a poster to advertise the element for people to buy it.

Ideas to Include:

Superhero

Turn an element into a superhero.

Ideas to Include:

Element Cube

Create a cube (or other shape) out of paper.

Ideas to Include:

Week 2

The kids asked for a scavenger hunt with the periodic table so I made this.

After they found the matching elements we pulled out our microscope to look at salt and sugar. We got sidetracked for a bit looking at other things under the microscope as well, but then I managed to get everyone (including me!) back on task.

We talked about what crystals are and how they form. Below are a couple of videos (they're similar, so you only need to pick one of them) that go over the different crystal structures. There are also oodles of crystal projects you can do. We only tackled making borax crystals this year, but I included the links for the rock candy and the crystal art project idea below too.

The borax crystals turned out so well and they could visibly see the crystals in less than 24 hours from starting the experiment! They had fun shaping their pipe cleaner into a shape of their choosing. The green spiral is a more delicate one compared to the dense zigzag of the blue crystal. Also, we dyed the water for both, but the pipe cleaner's color really overpowers the dye's color. So, you can probably skip that step. Also, make sure the end of the thread isn't hanging down touching the pipe cleaner (like the green one), because crystals will grow around it as well connecting it to the main shape.

Our final project of this week was revisiting how we can sort things in more than one way. We did some practice in this Google Slides presentation and then they had the project of designing their own periodic table for something.

They chose to make a periodic table of their favorite books (sorted by genre and then least to most words) and a periodic table of Lego sets (sorted by theme and then cheapest to most expensive.)

Week 3

I was most excited for this week to introduce them to how to balance chemical equations. I never took chemistry in high school but after learning how to balance chemical equations, I feel like I would have enjoyed it!

We used the Google Slides presentation to show how to balance the equations. Then, we rolled up our sleeves and used the manipulatives I made to practice balancing the equations and visually seeing how it works. Then they wrote their final answers on the question slips.

My son wasn't part of this unit study, but we tasked him with running the bank of compounds. He sorted out all of the manipulatives and helped the older kids find what they were looking for to solve the questions.

For additional learning and practice, I linked a couple of videos below and an online interactive tool for balancing equations.

Week 4

This was our last week in this unit study, so we bounced back to refresh on the Bohr diagram models of atoms. They already knew about the placement of the nucleus, protons, neutrons, and electrons, but this time I introduced valence electrons. 

I drew out a few circles like a bullseye on a piece of paper and we picked random elements from the periodic table. Then, we used tokens to fill in the shells with electrons. We picked elements from various columns to show how the valence electrons have a pattern with the different columns in the periodic table.

Then, we dived into the Google Slides presentation on different types of compound bonding. Intermixed are some hands-on activities. 

The kids' favorite was using pipe cleaners to represent each atom in the compound. We used matching colored beads for the valence electrons. They used the riddle cards to figure out how to distribute the valence electrons to create the bonds.

I included a couple of videos and some interactive online practice too.

Taking it Further

I had some keeners and we also dived a little into isotopes and used this fun interactive lab to explore different elements.