online course
Matter Lab
Matter Lab Grades 6 to 8
Free online chemistry course · 12 weeks
- Grade
- Grades 6 to 8
- Ages
- Ages 11 to 14
- Price
- Free
- Format
- Self-paced online course at learn.lanternlearn.com
About this course
Matter Lab Grades 6 to 8 is a free 12-week online chemistry course for middle schoolers that uses only kitchen materials. Students set up a bench at home and learn what matter and atoms are, how particles behave in solids, liquids and gases, how heat changes state, why things float or sink, how mixtures and solutions work, how atoms join into molecules, how to tell a physical change from a chemical change, why mass is conserved, how an indicator sorts acids from bases, why reactions warm up or cool down, and how natural resources become new materials. The course ends with a device the student designs, builds, tests and improves.
12-week list
Each week has short lessons Monday to Friday, a hands-on Bench Lab, and a Bench Day with the family on Saturday.
| Week | Topic | Focus | NGSS |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Everything Is Made of Something | Matter, atoms, elements and the periodic table | MS-PS1-1 |
| 2 | Solid, Liquid, Gas | The particle model of the three states | MS-PS1-4 |
| 3 | Heat, Temperature and Changing State | Thermal energy, heat, melting, freezing, boiling and condensing | MS-PS1-4 |
| 4 | Density: Why Things Float | Mass per volume, and a column of liquid layers | MS-PS1-2 |
| 5 | Mixtures and Solutions | Dissolving, solubility and separating mixtures | MS-PS1-2 |
| 6 | Atoms Team Up: Molecules | Water, carbon dioxide and salt as models | MS-PS1-1 |
| 7 | Physical Change or Chemical Change? | The signs of a reaction, and properties before and after | MS-PS1-2 |
| 8 | Nothing Lost: Conservation of Mass | A fizzing reaction in a sealed bag on a scale | MS-PS1-5 |
| 9 | Acids, Bases and a Cabbage Indicator | Sorting kitchen liquids by color | MS-PS1-2 |
| 10 | Reactions Give or Take Energy | Reactions that warm up and reactions that cool down | MS-PS1-6 |
| 11 | From Nature to New Materials | Paper, plastic, glass and steel, and where they come from | MS-PS1-3 |
| 12 | Design at the Bench | Build, test and improve your own device | MS-ETS1-1 |