I’ve recently read in a Facebook group that a teacher was searching for lessons and activities that covered the classification of matter because it was SO dull, and she needed some ideas. She needed something besides a worksheet on classification of matter. I thought about it, and if you’ve read my posts before, physical science is not as much of my jam as life science is; however, it’s totally growing on me! You see, when in comes to teaching matter, it should be AWESOME! Why? Because it’s all around us! We are matter, the stuff around us is matter, what we cannot see is matter, and that in itself is fascinating! So, if teachers can get hype about this subject, you can definitely pull students into the fun. Part of being a scientist is classifying things, and matter is no exception.
Check out these ideas, and yes, go ahead and bring the WOW Factor to your science classroom!
“The Before” of Ditching the Classification of Matter Practice Worksheet
Before you even start teaching a lesson to your students on this topic, you have GOT to hook them in. The goal in my classroom is learning, and not just compliance, so in order to get the students to WANT to learn, you have to get them excited about the topic that you are teaching.
One thing you could do is just talk about what matter is and talk about examples. If it has mass and takes up space, it’s matter! Students can look around the room. There are people, desks, tables, pencils, paper, a whiteboard, ceiling tiles, binders, shelves, dirt, air, and more. What about the microscopic level? There are definitely bacteria and viruses around. After this, you can talk about what is NOT matter. This can be a little tougher for students to understand, so you can give them examples and then let them brainstorm. Some examples of things that are not matter include love, dreams, information, memories, time, and vacuum. Just a discussion between the teacher and their classmates can get students excited about learning more about this topic.
If this isn’t enough, here is an awesome suggestion. This website, the Scale of the Universe 2 is AMAZING! You can let students see matter, microscopic and macroscopic. What’s amazing is that, in your classification of matter lesson, you will discuss that the building block of matter is an atom, but this website allows you to see so many things smaller than an atom, and this can lead into a great discussion. With this website, you can also see how big matter can be. Have students explore this for a little while. Surely, this will leave them at least a little intrigued!
Classification of Matter Digital Interactive Lesson
Now that you have your students attention, it’s time to get in the meat of the lesson and delve into some of the introductory details of this lesson. This is where you can get rid of the classification of matter chart worksheet and stop Googling for the classification of matter worksheet pdf! Why? Because it’s all included in the digital interactive lesson. Digital interactive lessons are lessons with questions embedded inside. This allows for students to only see a chunk of content at a time, process it, and assess their knowledge on it. Why is this important? It reduces student cognitive load. When this happens, students retain the information better!
This NO-PREP classification of matter lesson includes information on matter, atoms, protons, neutrons, electrons, atomic number and atomic mass, molecules, elements, compounds, and mixtures. There is a pre-assessment included at the beginning to allow students to see what they’ve already learned.
There are formative assessments built inside to check students knowledge on each of these topics. Included is a homogeneous mixture and heterogeneous mixture sort, drag-and-drop multiple choice, exploring outside resources, and so much more.
You can either teach this lesson by direct instruction and have students complete along with you. Nearpod is a great platform for this.
I love the self-paced classroom. Students can work by themselves, or even with a partner, to read through the lesson and answer the questions. Remember, the goal is learning!
No, It’s Still Not Time to Use a Classification of Matter Worksheet Doc
Let’s just get rid of that worksheet, even if you found a classification of matter worksheet with answers! All students are going to do is Google “worksheet classification of matter answers” anyway!
After students complete the lesson, it’s time for them to REALLY apply the information that they learned with hands-on exploration and activities. Here are two fun suggestions.
Model Creation: Atoms, Elements, Compounds, Mixtures
It’s time for students to apply some STEM knowledge as well! Give students a challenge:
Design and build a 3-D model of atoms, elements, compounds, and mixtures using only tape, scissors, aluminum foil, construction paper, markers, and glue!
Of course, you can make this challenge what you want. Last year, I allowed my students to use any other resources that they had. I also let my students do this in groups.
Students can create separate models, one for atom, one for element, one for compound, and one for mixture, or they can create a model that incorporates all of them but correctly depicts all categories of matter.
I love to allow students to create. They truly are very talented! So, afterward, it’s important to show off the best work.
You can get a HUGE piece of bulletin board paper to put on the wall outside of your classroom and draw this diagram on it. If small enough, you can tape the models in the appropriate categories. For student work that is too big, you can display in the classroom, media center, or any other places that you display student work in your school!
Heterogeneous and Homogeneous Mixtures Stations
Bring in different types of mixtures from home: Italian salad dressing, salt water, a pen with ink, shaving cream, chocolate chip cookies, soil, juice, trail mix, sugar, soda, oil and water, sterling silver jewelry, steel, vinegar, chocolate milk, and more.
Place these items in stations around the room and label them.
On a piece of paper, students can draw this chart.
In pairs, students can go to each station in the room to classify each item as a homogeneous or heterogeneous mixture. Students can classify them even further into a solution, colloid, or suspension.
As a follow up, you can discuss what atoms, elements, and compounds were apart of these mixtures. For example, sodium chloride (salt) is located in the salt water, and of course water molecules as well! What about steel? This is made up of a lot of the element iron. Students may not know a lot of these things, but it really gets them thinking about matter and the different categories.
Bonus: Elements, Compounds, and Mixtures Model Activity
Looking for something easy and engaging? This is a “gallery walk” style activity where students look at models of elements, compounds, and mixtures, identify them, and explain why they identified them that way.
So much fun! To find out more information, you can view this in the Bright in the Middle Shop and on TPT.
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