Teacher had a fish that floats in water. He floated in a 2litre bottle.
He had his own air tank (a biro cap, with no hole in the top, held on to the fish with a paper clip and elastic band). We had to figure out a way to get the fish to sink and then float again.
We tried turning the bottle upside down (couldn't do this in the sea though), shaking the bottle and holding it sideways. The way to get the fish to sink was to squeeze the bottle.
When you do this, the fish sinks to the bottom, and when you stop squeezing, the fish floats again. This happens because the air in the pen top helps the fish float.
He had his own air tank (a biro cap, with no hole in the top, held on to the fish with a paper clip and elastic band). We had to figure out a way to get the fish to sink and then float again. We tried turning the bottle upside down (couldn't do this in the sea though), shaking the bottle and holding it sideways. The way to get the fish to sink was to squeeze the bottle.
When you do this, the fish sinks to the bottom, and when you stop squeezing, the fish floats again. This happens because the air in the pen top helps the fish float. When you squeeze the bottle, the air in the cap gets squashed a little (it compresses). This means that the bottle fills a little with water instead. Now the fish hasn't enough air to keep him floating, and the fish sinks.
When you stop squeezing, the air in the pen cap expands again, and now there is enough air in the cap again so the fish can float. We also tried this with a diver and it works in just the same way.
The boat floated, but didn't move. When we put just one drop of washing up liquid at the back of the boat, the surface tension is broken and the boat shoots forward.
This was really impressive, but we could only do it once. (Actually, we did manage to try again, but only after the basin had been washed and dried to get rid of all traces of wash up liquid). We can't wait to try this in the bath!
We could get water to spill sideways. First of all we tried lots of things - pouring it out of the side or the back of the jug, using our fingers or hands to get the water to spill sideways. 
We managed best of all when we used a piece of string, and got the water to run sideways along the string.
The second time we tried this, we only took our hand away when the bottle was under water. This time the water stayed in the bottle. This is because the water in the bottle wanted to get out, while the water in the basin wanted to get in, so the water ended up going nowhere and stayed in the bottle. 
Surprise, surprise, the card stayed on the bottom of the pot without falling off. This is because the air on the bottom of the card is pushing the card up into the pot, and the water is trying to get out, so both end up going nowhere at all.
We got an acitmel bottle and put newspaper round it so that it looked like a volcano, and a tray underneath in case we made a mess. To make an ordinary volcano you need bread soda and vinegar, but we wanted a delux model so we used red food dye and wash up liquid as well. Bread soda and vinegar mixed together make a fizzy gas called Carbon Dioxide. This gas comes rushing out of the bottle. To make the foam red we used red food colouring, and for lovely bubbles we used a little wash up liquid as well. 
The third and final time we put the bread soda into a balloon and the vinegar in the bottle. When we stood the balloon up, the bread soda dropped into the bottle with the vinegar in it. The gas that was made blew the balloon up. It was exciting!
The powder and vinegar mixture began to fizz. We heard that when you mix vinegar and baking powder together, a gas called CO2 or Carbon Dioxide (bad air) is made. This gas is heavier than air, so it sits at the bottom of the glass. When enough CO2 is made, it pushes the Oxygen (O2 good air) up higher in the glass. Now that the candle can't reach the O2, the flame goes out.
We also learned that we breathe in Oxygen and breathe out Carbon Dioxide. Plants and trees do the opposite - they breathe in CO2 and breathe out O2. That is why it is so important to have lots of trees planted around us, and lots of trees in the world. 
The daffodil bulbs that we planted in autumn have started to show their stems/leaves above the ground. We hope they don't find the weather too cold. We look forward to seeing lots of daffodils in the spring! 
When we blew the ball, most of the time it jumped out of the bottle, instead of going in, as we expected. Lots of us tried this, and we then tried to find a sure way to get the ball in the goal. What we discovered was that if you blow very hard at the ball, the air rushes past the ball, hits off the bottom of the bottle, gets forced back up the bottle again, and rushes out of the bottle, taking the ball with it. 
If you want to get the ball in the bottle, you have either to blow really softly on the ball, or else you have to use a straw to blow air directly at the ball. We are going to practise this lots at home.
This causes the water in the straw to rise to the top, and as it reaches the top it is blown into small droplets which make a fine spray. 
We all tried and tried till we each could make a spray. Now we can make them easily at home.
We found out today how to make straws into musical instruments. We squeezed the top of the straw, then teacher cut the top in the shape of a pencil top (or mountain). 
We could get the straw to sing by holding it between our lips and blowing. Teacher has a slide whistle. We could see that a short whistle makes a high sound, while a long whistle makes a low sound. With our straws the long straw makes a low sound. We can cut it while we blow, and listen to the sound getting higher and higher as the straw gets shorter and shorter.
We have an aquarium in our school. It has sea fish and sea creatures in it. We pass the aquarium on our way in to school in the mornings. 
Today our class went to visit the aquarium. Look at all the creatures in it. 
We could find most of them.
Now the vibration travels through the table and you can hear it reasonably loudly. Teacher had a c tuning fork. To get a different note you need a different tuning fork.
If you touch the vibrating tuning fork off a plastic container of rice or peas, the rice or peas jump with the vibration. 
If you hold the vibrating tuning fork against a ping pong ball that is hanging from a string, the ping pong ball will jump away from the fork. Each time it touches the fork it jumps away from it, sometimes with a big jump. 
These experiments looked so great.
Mr. Bug came to visit us today. He had some really interesting bugs and animals with hime. He gave us a chance to see his animals, touch them, and learn how they live in the wild.
First of all he showed us his millipedes. They have 250 legs, these huge ones come from Africa and love to eat compost. We got to touch the millipede, and to see how he manages to move so many legs without falling over.
Next we saw giant snails, also from Africa. They love to eat bananas and fruit. They have no jaws so they can only lick their food. It must take a long time to eat an apple! 
We each got to hold one of the 6 snails, after spraying our hands with water so it our hands would feel nice to the snails. They felt tickly (which Matt told us was the snail licking us).
The Burmese python came out next. He was lovely to look at and to touch - not at all slimey or cold. We know that he is so shiny because he sheds his skin every time he starts to grow. 
Scorpions can sting. They have a stinger on the ends of their tails. They are shy animals but sometimes hide in shoes and boots, then sting the person who stands on them when they are putting on their boots. 
We don't have any scorpions in Ireland. We know that big claws mean small stings and small claws mean big stings. This scorpion had big claws and a small sting. He has 8 legs and 8 eyes so he is an arachnid - a cousin of the spiders. 
We looked at him but didn't touch.
The last animal that we saw was a tegu lizard - tegu means lizard in a South American language. This lizard was lovely to touch. He smells using his tongue which is forked in 2. He grows to be very big. This little lizard was still young - only 3 years old.
