Hi, Future Ticia 2025 here, and I’m updating my old science lessons so it’s a bit more useful for when you’re studying Flying Creatures. It was a fun way to illustrate how do water striders walk on water? I now return you to Past Ticia 2010
We read about how water striders walk on water. Well, obviously, you can’t just walk on water, so how do they do that?
Answer: They bend the rules.
Supplies needed for the experiment:
small bowl of water, a piece of toilet paper, small needle
Experimenting with how does a water strider walk on water
Procedure: rip a piece of toilet paper into fourths. Place the toilet paper on top of the water, and gently place the needle on top (like in the photo above).
Now, if you’ve done this right, the toilet paper will be saturated by the water, and the needle will float on the surface of the water. It’s very cool.
Why does this work?
Because water molecules have a very strong molecular bond, they want to stick together. So, the surface tension of the water holds the needle up if you do it correctly.
That is why the water strider is able to walk on water. Great wow factor for your kids.
Then we, of course, had to see if it would work with a normal piece of paper, and it did.
So, now we know how and why water striders can walk.
More great STEM lessons
- Zoo animals preschool unit
- Why do octopus change colors?
- crabs and lobsters lesson
- edible drop of blood
- Feathers experiment lesson
By John Stockla – Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=107676111
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