Look around you! Everything you see, from your desk to your clothes, and even the air you breathe, is made up of tiny things called atoms. Atoms are the building blocks of everything in the world, including you and me!
Atoms are so small that you can’t see them, even with the most powerful microscopes. But we know they exist because scientists have found ways to study them. Over a hundred years ago, a scientist named Ernest Rutherford discovered atoms by bouncing tiny particles off them, like kicking a soccer ball against a wall. This helped scientists learn more about atoms and what they’re made of.
Each atom is made up of three even smaller particles: protons, neutrons, and electrons. Protons have a positive charge, electrons have a negative charge, and neutrons have no charge at all. The protons and neutrons sit in the center of the atom, called the nucleus, while the electrons spin around the outside in a space called a shell.
Atoms come together to form elements, which are like the ingredients of everything around us. There are 120 different elements, and they are all listed on a special chart called the periodic table. Each element is made up of atoms with a specific number of protons. For example, oxygen atoms have eight protons, while helium atoms have two.
When atoms join together, they form molecules. Water is a great example of a molecule. It’s made up of two hydrogen atoms and one oxygen atom, which is why we call it H2O. Even though molecules are made of atoms, they are still too small to see without a special microscope.
Some elements, like neon, are made of single atoms. Others, like oxygen, usually consist of two atoms joined together, known as O2. Everything around us, from the air we breathe to the food we eat, is made up of these tiny atoms and molecules.
Think of everything around you as a recipe made of atoms. These atoms combine to form elements, and those elements come together to create molecules. This is how everything in the world is made, from metals and liquids to gases and even our own bodies!
Isn’t it amazing how such tiny things can make up the entire universe? We hope you enjoyed learning about atoms and how they make up everything around us!
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Atom Model Craft: Create your own model of an atom using craft materials like clay, beads, or buttons. Use different colors to represent protons, neutrons, and electrons. Arrange them to show the nucleus and the electron shells. Once you’ve built your model, explain to a friend or family member how the parts of the atom fit together and what each part does.
Element Scavenger Hunt: Go on a scavenger hunt around your home or classroom to find objects made from different elements. For example, look for items made of iron, like a frying pan, or copper, like a coin. Make a list of the objects you find and the elements they are made from. Discuss with your classmates or family how these elements are used in everyday life.
Molecule Building Challenge: Using small building blocks or interlocking toys, try to build simple molecules like water (H2O) or carbon dioxide (CO2). Use different colors or shapes to represent different atoms. After building your molecules, think about how these molecules are important in our daily lives, such as how water is essential for drinking and how plants use carbon dioxide for photosynthesis.
Sure! Here’s a sanitized version of the transcript:
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Atoms for Kids
Look around you. See the desk you’re sitting at, the clothes you’re wearing, the couch in your living room, the dog or cat that might be lying on that couch, and even that healthy snack you may be eating. Believe it or not, all of those things are made up of atoms. In fact, everything in the world that you can see, touch, and even things you can’t, such as air, are made up of tiny building blocks called atoms. Without these atoms, you would not exist, and neither would the things around you.
Atoms are so small you can’t see them—unimaginably small—but you can see, breathe, and touch the things made from atoms. Atoms make up the cells that are part of everybody’s body and the particles that make up every solid, liquid, and gas in the world.
So if atoms are so small, how do we even know they exist? They’re so small you can’t even see them with the highest-powered microscopes, but we do know they’re there. More than a hundred years ago, a scientist named Ernest Rutherford was able to bounce other small particles off of atoms and witnessed the interaction. It was kind of like bouncing a soccer ball off a tiny super ball. The way that super ball, or in Rutherford’s case, atoms acted told him they existed and what they were made of. The history of how atoms were discovered is a lesson for another time, but scientists have proven the existence of atoms in many different ways over the last century. They’re definitely there, and they’re really cool!
So what is an atom made of, and how does it behave? It’s hard to believe that inside every atom there are three even smaller particles. These particles are known as protons, neutrons, and electrons. The difference in the way these three particles exist within every atom and the way they interact with other atoms helps determine what these atoms create. These atoms make up wood, water, metal, and anything else, but we’ll get to that shortly.
First, let’s talk about these three particles: protons, neutrons, and electrons. A proton carries one unit of positive electric charge, an electron carries one unit of negative charge, and a neutron has no electric charge. Together, the protons and neutrons make up the nucleus of an atom, or its center, and the electrons spin around the outside of the nucleus in what is called a shell.
How do these tiny atoms work, and what do they do? The different ways that atoms are organized determine what they are or what elements they make up. Elements are the building blocks of molecules, and everything around us consists of molecules. All the elements are different, and there are 120 of them. These 120 elements are laid out in the periodic table of elements. This chart is used by scientists like physicists and chemists to study how solids, gases, and liquids behave. It all depends on what they’re made of.
You’ll probably spend a lot of time studying this chart later as you continue learning about science. This is the element oxygen. The number eight means that the atoms that make up oxygen have eight protons. This is helium, and its atoms have two protons. The number at the bottom tells us what the atomic weight of the element is. As you can see, there are 120 such elements on the periodic table, and each of those elements is made up of atoms.
Think of it this way: just as the letters in the word tell you what the word is, the number of protons, neutrons, and electrons that make up the atoms in an element tell you what the element is. When atoms and elements are joined together, they make up molecules. Water, for example, is a molecule. Each water molecule is made up of two hydrogen atoms and one oxygen atom and is sometimes referred to as H2O. It takes two atoms of hydrogen and one atom of oxygen to make water.
As we said, atoms are super tiny, and therefore the molecules they create are also really small and can’t be seen without a special microscope. Think about it: can you see a single molecule of water? No way! Even the smallest drop of water is made up of many molecules, and within those molecules are even tinier atoms of hydrogen and oxygen.
Some elements are actually made up of a single atom that doesn’t attach itself to other atoms. The element of neon is one such example; it has just one atom. But other elements are made up of more than one atom, like oxygen, which usually consists of two. It’s referred to as O2.
To sum up, try to think of all the things around us as a recipe of atoms. Atoms are incredibly tiny and consist of a certain number of protons, neutrons, and electrons. Those atoms combine together to form elements such as oxygen, hydrogen, and aluminum. In turn, these elements form molecules that make up all the stuff around us—from metals to liquids to gases, from our clothing to our food to our furniture. Even our own bodies are made up of billions and billions of atoms that form our skin, eyes, muscles, bones, and even our brains, which is hopefully where all this information about atoms will remain.
Hope you had fun learning with us! Visit us at learnbrite.org for thousands of free resources and turnkey solutions for teachers and homeschoolers.
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