Year 7 make indicator

This morning Year 7 have been making their own indicator out of red cabbage.

They did this by dissolving the red pigment in water before filtering the solution:

The risk from the red cabbage and water were considered and it was decided they were not dangerous so safety glasses could, for once, be worn as head bands without the wearer getting told off.

 Hot water was used to speed up the extraction process

 and the cabbage was ground in a pestle and mortar to make the solute smaller

 Then the mixture was filtered

 this got rid of the insoluble bits of cabbage

Now the red cabbage indicator was tested with lots of different substances

 Some substances tested were strong acids and alkalis so it was time to wear eye protection prpoerly.

 

They went around the lab to test substances with a known pH to see what colour the indicator turned:

At the end they made a mini pH scale comparing UI and our red cabbage indicator: