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Cool Floater, Hot Sinker Water

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Cool Floater, Hot Sinker
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Reading Level

	edHelper's suggested reading level:	grades 5 to 7
	Flesch-Kincaid grade level:	6.87

Vocabulary

challenging words:

phenomenon, suspense, heated, helium, nitrogen, volume, questioning, atmosphere, substance, density, unit, vapor, universe, therefore, pipes, boils

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Cool Floater, Hot Sinker By Trista L. Pollard

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¹     It is the hottest day of the summer. You decide to celebrate your ability to survive the heat by drinking a tall, cold glass of lemonade. As you go to take your first gulp, you pause with a questioning look on your face. The little voice inside your head asks the question as the universe waits for the answer. "If ice is just frozen water, why does it float in liquid water?" Now, I am sure that if you were hot, you would have just continued to take your gulp of lemonade. However, I know this question has crossed your mind at some point. Well, I will not keep you in suspense any longer. This scientific phenomenon relates to a little word called density.
 
²     Density is the amount of matter in an object within a defined space. Another way to define density is the mass of an object per unit of volume. Density changes with temperature. As a result, water, and all other substances, have different densities in different states of matter. Let's see what happens when water changes into its different forms.
 
³     Water is a liquid. This means that it has a definite volume. It takes up space in any container. Water changes to a solid (ice) when it freezes at a temperature of 0 degrees Celsius. It changes into gas (water vapor) when it boils at 100 degrees Celsius. There is a general rule for how matter or substances such as water will act when it gets hot or cold. When matter becomes hot, it expands, and when it becomes cold, it contracts. Water, however, is a rule-breaker.

Paragraphs 4 to 8:
For the complete story with questions: click here for printable

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