Temperature Change of Dissolving Salt

Highlights of the activity

1. Students are placed into small groups and asked to calculate the change in temperature of a cup of water due to the dissolution of NaCl.
2. Each group will practice finding the change in temperature of a substance after finding the energy transfer resulting from a thermodynamic process.

Reasons to spend class time on the activity

This activity provides a solid mathematical computation that introduces the idea that a process such as dissolution results in a transfer of energy. Students are also given the opportunity to analyze how the entropy of water-salt system changes in the dissolution process.

This experiment has never been done, so think of it as no more than an interesting idea at this stage. I didn't have time for it in class, and thus haven't tested it. – David Roundy

Reflections

• Reflections from the original implementation.

• Reflections from "official" adapters/adopters.

• Reflections from the general public.

Instructor's Guide

• Wiki version

Student Handouts

eedissolvesalthand.pdf

eedissolvesalthand.tex