Energy and Electricity: Using Heat Energy to Melt Crayons

This is my "Melting Crayons" experiment. Students will be shown 3 different forms of crayons:

Crayon shavings, broken crayon pieces, and a whole crayon. Each form of crayon should be placed between a folded piece of wax paper, then pressed on with an iron for a number of seconds, no more than 20-30. Ideally the whole crayon will take the longest to melt, while the shaved crayon will melt the easiest. The idea is to get an understanding of what heat energy can do, but also to see which form of crayon "matter" will melt the easiest.

Students will complete the first side of the activity together before the experiment, then do the experiment, and finally will write about their conclusions. The recording sheet follows the scientific method/process skills when conducting an experiment.

Step One: Make Guesses
Step Two: Determine if the test is fair
Step Three: Experiment
Step Four: Draw the experiment
Step Five: Discuss findings
Step Six: Suggest an alternative item to melt