Separating mixtures

We had a fun time in Science today...

We worked in groups of four to investigate whether cotton wool or kitchen towel was the best material to filter sand out of water. Our results showed us that kitchen towel worked best, but only just! The water we filtered with kitchen towel was a little more translucent than the water filtered using cotton wool. We didn't get any water looking transparent though, and even if we had we wouldn't have drunk it - it would have been full of micro-bacteria and not safe to drink. Yuk!

We also separated dried pasta using a colander, rice using a sieve and metal paper clips using a magnet!