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What carries
the charge?
Three materials. One question: what must be able to move?
Tres materiales. Una pregunta: ¿qué debe poder moverse?
A companion activity informed by OpenSciEd C.2, Lesson 14. Independently created; not an official OpenSciEd resource.
Is “water conducts electricity” enough?
“Water itself carries electric current. Salt just makes the water a stronger conductor.”
«El agua misma transporta la corriente eléctrica. La sal solo hace que el agua sea mejor conductora».
This is a claim to investigate, not a fact to memorize. Compare very pure water, solid sodium chloride, and sodium chloride dissolved in water.
Explain your prediction to a partner. Consider both charge and motion. Use a sketch, words, or any language.
Unpack the words
Conduct: allow electric charge to flow through a material.
Dissolved: dispersed through a liquid. The salt has not vanished.
Mobile: able to move through the material, not just vibrate in one place.
Conducir: permitir el flujo de carga eléctrica por un material.
Disuelto: disperso en un líquido; la sal no desapareció.
Móvil: capaz de desplazarse por el material.
Look inside the materials
Choose a material and predict its behavior before revealing the model outcome.
Off → Low → Medium → High. Relative settings, not measured field values. Temperature, composition, and sample dimensions stay constant.
Apagado → Bajo → Medio → Alto. La temperatura, la composición y las dimensiones de la muestra permanecen constantes.
Symbols: H₂O = neutral water molecule; Na⁺ = positive sodium ion; Cl⁻ = negative chloride ion. Symbols and spacing are not to scale.
Investigate: change one thing at a time
- Select salt solution. Move from Low to High. What changes about drift and current?
- Return to Off. Does random particle motion stop, or only net drift?
- Choose Low and reverse the field. Which way does each ion drift?
- Keep the field at High and select solid salt. Why does charge alone not guarantee current?
Al aumentar el campo eléctrico, ___. La conductividad del material ___. Al invertir el campo, los iones positivos ___ y los negativos ___.
Language support: describe before explaining
I notice ___ particles. They can / cannot move through the material.
When an electric field is applied, ___.
This material conducts well / poorly because ___.
Observo partículas de ___. Pueden / no pueden desplazarse por el material.
Cuando se aplica un campo eléctrico, ___.
Este material conduce bien / mal porque ___.
What this model shows and leaves out
This is a qualitative explanatory model, not a real experiment or a measured simulation. Compare it with evidence from your class investigations. The field direction is reversible. Longer arrows represent greater average drift within the same solution as field strength increases. They are schematic, not measured speeds; equal arrow lengths do not mean the two ion types have equal mobilities. The diagram shows drift arrows, not animated trajectories. Ions also move randomly. At fixed temperature and composition in this modest-field model, a stronger field increases current while conductivity stays constant. Heating, electrical breakdown, and extreme lightning fields are outside this model.
Solid ions vibrate around lattice positions; they cannot travel freely through the solid in this classroom model. Water molecules move even when there is no field. Neutral water molecules are polar, but are not mobile ions.
Very pure water has a tiny concentration of H₃O⁺ and OH⁻ ions and very low conductivity. Those rare ions are omitted from the picture. Water molecules around dissolved ions, electrode reactions, the full circuit, and lightning are not modeled.
Charge is necessary. Mobility matters.
Use your class evidence and the three models to improve the original claim.
Build an explanation: components → interactions → mechanism
Components: Name the particles present.
Interactions: Explain how oppositely charged ions are held in a solid and how charges respond to an electric field.
Mechanism: Explain how mobile ions allow charge to move through a solution.
Solid salt contains ___, but ___. In solution, ___. Therefore, ___.
La sal sólida contiene ___, pero ___. En la disolución, ___. Por lo tanto, ___.
Check your revised particle model
Explain in your notebook or your teacher’s Google Form: How would you revise “water itself carries electric current”? Use at least two materials as evidence. You may explain in any language and include a labeled sketch.
¿Cómo revisarías la afirmación «el agua misma transporta la corriente eléctrica»? Usa por lo menos dos materiales como evidencia. Puedes explicar en cualquier idioma e incluir un dibujo con etiquetas.
After discussing: compare with one possible explanation
Very pure water conducts very poorly because it has very few mobile ions. Solid sodium chloride contains charged ions, but they are held in lattice positions. In sodium chloride solution, the ions can move through the liquid. An electric field causes positive and negative ions to drift in opposite directions, transporting charge. Having charged particles is not enough; they must be mobile.
Transfer your model
A fictional clear solution contains only neutral solute molecules dispersed in very pure water. Assume the solute does not produce ions. Does being dissolved guarantee good conductivity?
Return to the OpenSciEd question
Natural water contains dissolved ions. Add this particle-level mechanism to your class’s model of how charge can move through water. What other parts would you need to explain a lightning event?
This model cannot determine lightning safety or identify a safe body of water. It is not an instruction to test electricity in water.
What changed your thinking?
Use evidence from the models and your class investigations. You can respond in English, Spanish, or another language.
Usa evidencia de los modelos y de las investigaciones de tu clase. Puedes responder en inglés, español u otro idioma.
This is a practice form, not a connected Google Form. Nothing is sent or saved. No Google sign-in takes place here. Do not enter your name, email, or password.
Choose a submission option to preview how it would work.
Why does salt solution conduct much better than solid salt? Refer to charge and mobility.
¿Cómo cambió tu explicación? Al principio pensaba… Ahora pienso… porque…
Describe what changed and what stayed the same. Consider ion drift, current, and conductivity.
¿Qué cambió al aumentar el campo eléctrico? ¿Qué permaneció igual?
* Required for this practice submission. Confidence is a reflection, not a grade.
Visual word bank · Banco visual de palabras
Simplified symbols, not particle sizes or measured motion.
Charge / Carga
An electrical property that can be positive or negative.
Propiedad eléctrica que puede ser positiva o negativa.
Ion / Ion
A particle with a net electric charge. Na⁺ has a net positive charge.
Partícula con carga eléctrica neta. Na⁺ tiene carga neta positiva.
Crystal lattice / Red cristalina
An ordered arrangement. Ions in solid salt stay near their lattice positions.
Estructura ordenada. Los iones permanecen cerca de sus posiciones en la red.
Solution / Disolución
A uniform mixture. Here, mobile Na⁺ and Cl⁻ ions are dispersed among water molecules.
Mezcla uniforme. Aquí, los iones móviles están dispersos entre moléculas de agua.
Electric field / Campo eléctrico
Describes electric force per unit positive charge. A positive ion feels force with the field; a negative ion, against it.
Describe la fuerza eléctrica por unidad de carga positiva. Las cargas negativas sienten fuerza en sentido opuesto al campo.
Conductivity / Conductividad
How readily a material carries current. Mobile charge carriers matter. It is a material property, not the current itself.
Facilidad de un material para conducir corriente. Importan los portadores de carga móviles.
Teacher guide · Lesson fit, submission & deployment
Source and instructional placement
Reference: OpenSciEd, C.2 Lesson 14 Teacher Edition: Why are some places safer than others when lightning strikes?, supplied PDF. Its opening navigation revisits pure water and dissolved ions; Parts 2–3 develop a consensus checklist and models; Part 6 uses peer feedback to revise explanations. This original companion supports those moves, especially learning goals 14.A and 14.B. It addresses one water-conductivity mechanism, not the complete lightning system or the full HS-PS2-6 performance expectation.
Use after the investigations summarized in Lesson 14’s “Previous Lesson” section. The supplied file references separate checklists, readings, and an Airplane Transfer Task; those materials were not attached and have not been reproduced. Do not use this as a substitute for the unit investigations or summative assessment. The neutral-solute transfer question is newly authored.
Misconceptions to listen for
“All water conducts well”; “solid salt has no charges”; “dissolving creates ions”; “all dissolved substances conduct”; “electrons are the moving carriers in salt solution.” Support students in distinguishing charged particles from mobile charged particles. A solid lattice still contains ions. In metals, mobile electrons carry current; in the bulk salt solution shown here, mobile ions carry it.
Suggested 15-minute routine
3 minutes: predict and discuss. 5 minutes: compare all three materials, first at Off, then Low and High, then with the field reversed. 5 minutes: revise a labeled model and explain it to a partner. 2 minutes: complete the transfer question and identify one revision prompted by feedback.
Invite students to rehearse in a home language, point to the model, and use optional sentence frames. Spanish supports supplement rather than fully translate the interface. Review translations with a proficient speaker. Do not equate English fluency with chemistry understanding.
Google Form exit ticket
- Which material did you initially predict would conduct, and what changed your thinking?
- Why does solid salt contain charges but conduct poorly?
- Explain how ions transport charge in salt solution. Use two materials and class evidence.
- Why does dissolving a substance not always make a good conductor?
- What changes when you increase field strength: current, conductivity, or both? Explain the model assumptions.
- What is one limitation of this model?
Add the form separately below this activity in Google Sites, or link it from the Site. Students submit through that form; this HTML does not collect or send answers. Use your district-approved account, appropriate responder permissions, and staff-only response access. The Reflect step is an interactive mockup only. No form or Google authentication is connected in this file.
Connect the two submission choices
Create two Google Forms with the same reflection questions. For the anonymous-response form, turn off email collection and omit names, student IDs, and identifying questions. Do not enable a one-response limit if you intend to avoid the sign-in requirement that setting introduces. Configure responder access according to district policy. Tell students not to identify themselves in free text. Anonymous here means no identity attached to the teacher’s response record, not anonymity from Google, school systems, or clues in the response.
For the identified form, use verified email collection and restrict access to the intended school responders. Google handles account sign-in on its own page; never collect passwords in this HTML. A single form’s verified-email setting cannot be switched on or off by a student selecting a question answer. Link each route to its corresponding form. Keep response summaries off and response access limited to authorized staff. Replace this mockup with those real form links before asking students to submit graded work.
Google Sites setup
Open this text file in a plain-text editor and copy all contents. In Google Sites choose Insert → Embed → Embed code; paste, preview, and insert. Enlarge the embed and publish using district-required permissions. Test the published page with a student account. Changes require replacing the embedded code and republishing.
The file uses no external libraries, network calls, analytics, AI services, or persistent storage. Student selections stay in page memory. Hosting and any added Google Form have separate data practices; district approval and configuration are still required. This is not a COPPA or FERPA compliance certification.
Scientific precision and references
“Very poor conductor” avoids treating pure water’s conductivity as exactly zero. The model does not introduce detailed bonding theories or electrode chemistry, consistent with Lesson 14’s stated scope. Outcomes are qualitative and not measured data.
Supporting reference: USGS, Specific Conductance (dissolved positive and negative ions contribute to conductivity). This link opens only when selected.
Adaptation prompt for the teacher workshop
“Create a self-contained HTML activity targeting [misconception] in [lesson]. Start with a prediction, compare different particle models, and ask students to revise a causal explanation using class evidence. Include optional language supports, accessible controls, explicit model limitations, and qualitative rather than invented measured outcomes. Use inline CSS and JavaScript with no external resources, AI calls, student accounts, data submission, or storage. Keep written submission in a separate district-approved form.”