cell baggies (with a twist)

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Home : 2006 : August : 13

cell baggies (with a twist)
By Snierman

You make jello (yellow is best) and 2/3 fill up the baggies. Keep them in the fridge overnight. Take them to school and have peanut, green grapes and red grapes for each bag. Explain the parts of a cell and add something
to the bag with each description. The baggie is the cell wall, peanut is the nucleus, the red grapes are the mitochondria, and if you want to show the difference between a plant cell and other cell, put green grapes for chloroplasts. After you have done it, let them do them their own. When you seal the ziplock baggies, squeeze out the air so they lay flat with no air pockets.

If

you leave them out for a week or so, they provide a great example of how/why their bodies make gas! If you squeeze all the air out, they will be able to see that after time, the food products in the baggies break down and form gas. It was an accident that I discovered this but my fourh graders LOVED the little side lesson. (I am known for being the "gross" teacher.... Fun stuff, and kids really remember it!)