Skittles Science... Reversible & Irreversible Change

We had a "sweet" time in science today with our big idea on the properties of matter and exploration of reversible and irreversible change. After talking about all the things that represent reversible change, and all the things that represent irreversible change, I decided to surprise the students with a  sweet science treat.

REVERSIBLE CHANGE...

First, I brought out a container filled with Skittles and we made our observations. We noticed that the Skittles were arranged and layered by color. We talked about the pattern of colors in the mason jar. After finishing our observations, I picked up the mason jar, flashed the class my best evil smile, and gave the jar a really good shake... GASP! All that hard work of separating two big bags of Skittles by color, and then carefully layering them in the mason jar for today's science was gone! Now, we had a hot mess of Skittles without any color pattern whatsoever. I asked the students if this was reversible or irreversible change. The answer was unanimous... REVERSIBLE CHANGE! The students explained to me that I could pour the Skittles out, separate them by color (again), and then layer them in the mason jar. They were absolutely correct!

IRREVERSIBLE CHANGE...

Next, I took a few of the Skittles and dropped them into a glass of water. We observed what happened to the Skittles over the next several minutes. The colors from the Skittles were beginning to spread out into the water, and the Skittles were turning white as the colors dissolved away from them. Once again, I asked the students if this was reversible or irreversible change... and once again, the answer was unanimous... IRREVERSIBLE CHANGE! The students explained to me that I could not remove the colors from the water, put the colors back on the Skittles, and then make the Skittles and water like they were before I dropped the Skittles into the glass of water. Spot on! I couldn't be prouder of my second grade scientists.

Of course, once we were done with our exploration of reversible and irreversible change, we got to enjoy our sweet science treat... the Skittles.