Food Containers

Timmy, Ella, Rebecca & Yoh

The Quidditch World Cup Association was not sure which material would be the best insulator for the Quidditch World Cup. We were asked by ‘The Hopping Pot’, to carry out an investigation to find out which material would be most suitable for their food packaging.

Predictions

What we expect to discover

We predicted that Brown Paper and the Brown Card would be the strongest materials. We also predicted that the Brown Card and the Brown Paper would hold the most marbles, making it perfect for ‘The Hopping Pot’s’ food packaging. The other papers we predict will not be as good. The tracing paper and A4 paper look easy to rip, but the brown card and brown paper look much harder to rip.

A Fair Test In Science?

One thing changes, everything else stays the same!

A fair test in science means: “One thing changes, everything else stays the same!” To make our experiment fair, we planned to change the material we were testing every time, whilst keeping everything else the same. We kept the marbles the same size and weight, the yoghurt pots the same and the materials size the same. In our fair test, we were looking for the most suitable material for food packaging that we could recommend for use in ‘The Hopping Pot’ tent.

The actual INVESTIGATION

What did you do?

We drew a table for our experiment so we could record which material was the strongest. This would help us to identify which materials would be the most suitable for use in ‘The Hopping Pot’ tent. Throughout the experiment, we recorded the number of marbles each material could hold before breaking.

Findings

What did you discover?

It was a fun and thrilling experiment! It turned out that we were correct with our predictions. The Brown Card and Brown Paper turned out to be the strongest, being able to support the weight of 201 marbles each! The Kitchen Roll and Tracing Paper were only able to hold 10 marbles each before breaking. The A4 Paper came second with 63 marbles and the Cartridge Paper came third holding 50 marbles. We then recorded our results in a bar graph, to clearly show how many marbles each material could hold.

Variables

What would you change?

If we could change something about this experiment, we think we could change the tape that we used to hang the materials. This is because during the experiment, the tape kept sliding off the table. So maybe next time, we could use Superglue because it is much stronger and less likely to move. Also, we could do another experiment and make the paper wet to see if it gets weaker. We would have to choose the most waterproof one because, well, you don’t want a soggy meal, right?

TO CONCLUDE

Our suggestions

We found out that Brown Card would be the most suitable material for food packaging in ‘The Hopping Pot’ tent because it was very strong and the most unlikely to break. We didn’t choose kitchen roll and tracing paper because they broke too easily. Also, we didn’t choose Cartridge Paper and A4 paper because despite being somewhat strong, we found that if they absorbed water, they would become too weak and rip easily, which will not work in the rain. The Brown Paper might not be a good choice either, because it is easier to fold than the Brown Card might be. Therefore, we strongly recommend that the Hopping Pot tent must use Brown Card for their food packaging.