"Chemis-Tree" Makes Silver-Plated Ornaments

As classes wind down for the semester, and students gear up for midterms, the approaching winter break can bring a lot of excitement. Grier students and staff alike work hard to build moments of holiday reflection into this busy time. Sometimes, literally!
As you walk around campus, the signs of the season are everywhere. Spools of ribbon are set out for class projects. Paper elves hang out by the Learning Skills classrooms (with one very excited Buddy the Elf). Paper snowmen, snowflakes, and other crafty celebrations of the approaching winter break deck the halls.

In Mrs. Myers' Chemistry class, for instance, students are silver-plating their own ornaments! They mixed together silver nitrate, ammonia, and sodium hydroxide and placed it all into a glass ornament. Then they added a dextrose solution and swirled it around the inside of the ball to coat the inside surface of the ornament. 

It started out as a clear solution and changed to a brown color before finally changing to silver. Once they had the silver color they coated the inside of the glass ornament with black paint to seal the solution and stop it from evaporating. 

Now each of Mrs. Myers' chemistry students can take home their own moment of holiday reflection!
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Grier School

2522 Grier School Rd. | P.O. Box 308; Birmingham, PA 16686-0308
Phone: 814-684-3000 | Fax: 814-684-2177