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Module: Is There Water On Mars?
Grades 9-12, Three Weeks
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Is there liquid water on Mars? By experimenting with water as it changes state and investigating some effects of air pressure, students not only learn core ideas in physical science but can deduce the water situation on Mars by applying those concepts.

Water Activities 1 & 2: How Hot Can You Make Water? and How Fast Does Water Warm as Ice Melts?

Purpose: To discover the existence of two temperature plateaus while water changes state and come to grips with what changes of state mean at the molecular level.

To have students graph the temperature of an ice-water slurry as it is heated and discover the existence of another transition plateau.

Key Concepts

  • Water can only be heated to its boiling temperature.
  • The slope of a graph line in this activity shows the rate of temperature change.
  • The temperature of ice water can rise only after all the ice has melted.
  • Temperature measures the average vibrational energy of a particle or group of particles.
  • As the water in Activity 1 boiled and the ice in Activity 2 melted, the particles used the energy from the heat source to gain the extra kinetic energy required to change state. As a result, the temperature during these transitions never changed.
Water Activity 3: How Can We Increase The Height of The Plateau?

Purpose: To have students increase the boiling temperature of water by increasing the pressure in the container.

Key Concepts
  • Water boils when its vapor pressure equals atmospheric pressure. As a result, water's boiling temperature is pressure, rather than temperature, dependent.
Water Activity 4: Do Fish Believe in Water? Do Students Believe in Air?

Purpose: To have students perform several activities showing that Earth's atmosphere exerts considerable force at the surface

Key Concepts

  • Air has mass and volume.
  • Air pressure is a function of the mass and temperature of the atmosphere in conjunction with Earth's gravitational pull.
  • The particles in high-pressure air are packed more densely than those in low-pressure air.
  • Air flows from areas of high pressure to areas of low pressure to equalize the pressures.
  • When the volume of a given mass of gas increases, its pressure decreases, provided that the temperature remains constant (Boyle's Law).
Water Activity 5: Testing Your Hypothesis by Boiling Water Below Its Boiling Point

Purpose: To have students boil water below its typical boiling temperature by reducing the pressure above the surface of the liquid

Key Concepts

  • Water boils when its vapor pressure equals atmospheric pressure. As a result, water's boiling temperature is pressure, rather than temperature, dependent.
Water Activity 6: Is There Liquid Water On Mars?
Purpose: To have students analyze actual data and images to assess whether there is liquid water on Mars

Key Concepts
  • Current climatic conditions make the existence of liquid water on Mars virtually impossible.
  • Features on the Martian surface provide strong evidence for past flows of large amounts of water.
Water Activity 7: Where Would You Search for Water on Mars?
Purpose: To help students develop an ongoing connection to the Mars missions.

Key Concepts
  • Each Mars mission has specific objectives and the instruments it needs to achieve them.
  • Space missions arise out of questions people have about Mars, and students can generate questions worthy of future study.
  • Every mission has a specific timetable, and students can follow the progress of each mission in a number of ways.


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