1-800-452-1261
Log In
360Science™ blends the best of student-engaging digital content with easily adaptable hands-on labs to offer your students a uniquely comprehensive learning experience.
In this lab experience, students create liquid crystal sandwiches both with and without a black background. They then observe how the colors change when heat is applied and use a water bath to determine the temperature range of their liquid crystals. Editable, differentiated instructions range from a time-sensitive prescriptive lab to full open inquiry, and robust online videos and content—including a virtual reality (VR) simulation—help students prepare for and better understand the labs they’re conducting.
Options:
(Select option to see volume pricing availability)
360Science™: Liquid Crystals: The Fourth State of Matter
Concepts: States of matter, liquid crystals, nanotechnology, diffraction
Outcomes: Liquid crystals are an odd substance. They go from a white power to an opalescent shimmery liquid when heated. The colors appear differently when they are on a white versus black background and when looked at with white light. Liquid crystals as temperature strips work best on a black background. When heated, the red color indicates the lower edge of the temperature range. Green is the middle, and blue is the top of the temperature range. When the ratio favors the cholesteryl oleyl carbonate, the temperature range is low. When the ratio favors cholesteryl pelargonate, the temperature range is higher.
Associated Phenomena: Product Design
Our 1-year option provides access to all digital content for one year plus lab supplies for a single class of 30 students. Our 3-year option extends access to digital content to three years, with a 30% discount on refill supply kits years 2 and 3.
What is Flinn 360Science™?
We’re introducing a whole new way to teach experiential science! We’ve taken a hard look at science study from all perspectives and, thanks to the feedback of thousands of teachers nationwide, we’ve created a way to make it easier to provide personalized instruction while delivering the kind of lab experiences your students truly need.
Our new and comprehensive learning solutions are designed to bring science to life by giving you all the tools you need to incorporate more (and effective) hands-on learning in your classroom or lab. 360Science allows you to provide your students with the support they need to make real-world connections to key scientific principles and help make those abstract concepts concrete.
Every 360Science lab solves the most common challenges educators face in bringing more hands-on science to their students—from not having enough time to matching the right level of challenge for students’ abilities to providing appropriate background content, safety techniques, assessments and more.
Enable student-driven, blended learning through a unique combination of leveled lab instructions supporting prescriptive, guided- and open-inquiry lab exercises (see PDF resource for specific details) with robust digital content, such as videos and carefully curated Open Educational Resources (OER)—along with virtual reality and simulation exercises. From editable, digital instructions to assessments and alignment with Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS), we have everything you need to improve mastery, remove the intimidation factor and foster your students’ natural curiosity.
HS-PS1-3: Plan and conduct an investigation to gather evidence to compare the structure of substances at the bulk scale to infer the strength of electrical forces between particles.
360Science™: Liquid Crystals: The Fourth State of Matter