Science In Year 4-Teeth Experiment

This week we had a very exciting Science lesson in which we got to conduct a really interesting experiment.

Colgate (the toothpaste company) had sent us a special letter telling us that they were developing a new toothpaste for children to fight against tooth decay.

They explained that by consuming lots of food and drinks which contain sugar such as fizzy drinks (eg Cola Cola), sweets and fruit juices that tooth decay will occur. When plaque (a sticky film of bacteria on teeth) mixes with sugars in food, acid is formed. This acid is bad for our teeth and if teeth are exposed to a lot of acid our teeth can become damaged.

Colgate then tasked us to create an experiment which investigates the impact of acid on teeth so they could ‘use’ our results to develop a new range of children’s toothpastes to protect teeth against acid and decay. Year 4 gladly accepted the challenge! 

We used eggs in our experiment (because their shells have a similar chemical make up as our tooth enamel) and a range of liquids such as vinegar, Coca-Cola and water to see which liquid would cause the most damage to the eggs and how long this would take.

To make our investigation a fair test, we used eggs of a similar size and colour, the same amount of liquid in each beaker and the same amount of time each egg spent in the liquid. We also discussed why we needed to use eggs rather than teeth, as these would be difficult to get and it would be unethical as it would damage a human being.

We also covered one egg in toothpaste and submerged it into some cola cola to see if toothpaste protected the egg.

Year 4 then wrote up our investigation including their own prediction of the impact that an acid will have on the enamel of the ‘teeth’ and a labelled diagram of our experiment.

Next week we are going to check the results and see what impact (if any) the acid has on the eggs. We will then be reporting our findings back to Colgate! 

What was your favourite part of our experiment?