Chemical Dominoes

The Project

Our driving question for this project was: How do substances combine/react to make new substances combine/react to make new substances? How can we categorize, explain, and make predictions about reactions?

The instructions we were given for the game was to create a board game for children and parents that consisted of a series of chemical and physical reactions players will experience and the end goal of the project was to light up an LED through a breadboard circuit.

Components we had to add to our board game includes: instructions on how to play, detailed safety precautions, blueprint drawings of our board, playing instructions, and a detailed explanation of all chemical reactions included in our game.

Evidence of Work

Our idea for our Chemical Dominoes board game was Wordle. Wordle is played by trying to guess a five letter word and you have six attempts to get the word right. Each time you put in a word it will tell whether you got a letter in the right place, the right letter in the wrong place, or the letter is not located in the word at all.

Everyone in our group plays the daily Worlde and we all knew how many people also play and enjoy the game so we thought it was a great idea. We started out by thinking how we could make it a Chemistry themed game and we did that by making all of our words you have to guess Chemistry related words. The New York times also makes other games aside from Wordle that are closely related to it, and every game ends in "-dle" these including Nerdle(Math), Octordle (8 letter word), Heardle(Songs), etc... So we decided we would name our board Chem-dle because it is a chemistry word guessing game.

Reactions

After coming up with our board game idea we had to figure out how to include our different types needed for the project. The reactions we had to put in our game were a single replacement reaction, double replacement reaction, and production of gas.

Our double replacement reaction is used when a players guesses a word. In all of our petri dishes there was a solution of potassium iodide and it depended on whether they got the letters in the right spot, right letter wrong spot, or wrong letter in general to determine if a reaction would occur. Lead nitrate would be added to the solution if they got it in the wrong spot but right letter and it would show as yellow. If they got the letter right lead nitrate and blue food coloring would be added to form a green solution. And if they guessed a letter that was not in the final word, water was added which resulted in no solution. Reaction formula: 2KI(aq) + Pb(NO3)2(aq) --> PbI2(s) + 2KNO3(aq)

Our single replacement reaction occurred after the player got all of the letters right and got the final word correct. A thin strip of aluminum is placed in a petri dish connected to two alligator clips which are connected to a breadboard circuit. Copper chloride solution is added and the aluminum switches place with the copper in copper chloride, producing copper and aluminum chloride. This reaction dissolves the aluminum, which separates the wires of the breadboard and causes the LEDs to light up. Reaction Formula: 2Al(s) + 3CuCl2(aq) --> 2AlCl3(aq) + 3Cu(s)

Our final reaction, production of a gass, also occured after the player guessed the word correctly. Sodium bicarbonate (baking soda) inside a water balloon is poured in acetic acid (vinegar) and reacts to produce sodium acetate, water, and carbon dioxide. This reaction blows up a balloon that is filled with glitter, causing the balloon to pop. Reaction formula: NaHCO3(s) + HC2H3O2(aq) -> NaC2H3O2(aq) + H2O(l) + CO2(g)

Gallery

Content

Double Replacement Reaction: Two aqueous, ionic compounds exchange ions and forms two new ionic compounds

Single Replacement Reaction: An element replaces it like element in an ionic compound or acid

Synthesis reaction: Two or more reactants make one product

Decomposition Reaction: one reactant yields two or more products

Combustion Reaction: A high-temperature exothermic redox between a fuel and an oxidant and it always forms carbon dioxide and water

Reactant: The starting materials in a chemical reaction and they undergo a chemical change in which chemical bonds are broken and new ones formed to make products

Product: A substance that is formed as the result of a chemical reaction.

Precipitate: Insoluble ionic solid products of a reaction, formed when certain cations and anions combine in an aqueous solution

Soluble: The ability of a substance, the solute, to form a solution with another substance, the solvent.

Insoluble: A substance (solid) that will not dissolve in a solvent even after mixing

Activity Series: A type of ordering system for elements, which ranks how reactive a certain element is in relation to other elements.

Solubility Guidelines: A list of different ions and their exceptions for whether they form a precipitate or stay aqueous; used predict whether product of double replacement reaction is a solid or aqueous.

Reflection

I really enjoyed this project and it brought me back to my first freshman year STEM project, the Rube Goldberg Machine. It was really nice getting back to the Maker's Space and being able to build on a board, anything we wanted using our creativity. This project was also our in the past two years where we have had parents, siblings, and judges come and see/play our games and projects. I also really enjoyed my group because we all cooperated really well and had fun throughout the project.

Some things I did well this project included collaborating and communicating well with my team. This project we had a very strong team including group members all having really good understanding of our subject. We collaborated well by splitting up the work and everyone using their certain strengths to get work for our project done. I also communicated very well in this project, asking questions when I did not understand certain aspects of the project.

Ways I believe I can improve for the next project are taking a bigger leadership role in the group and in the project and to set goals at the beginning of the project to try and accomplish. This project I did not take a big role as a leader in the beginning because I did not have really strong understanding of some of the components but as time went on I began to engage more and take a larger role. For the next project I also believe that making goals at the start of the project will result in being more effective and getting all things done on time. Overall this was an amazing project and I expanded my reaction knowledge by a lot and cannot wait for the next project!!