Questions:

1. Describe how the heat energy transferred from the hot plate to the butter.
2. How did the results compare to your predictions?
3. Which of the tested materials were the two best conductors?  What is your evidence?
   
4. Which of the tested materials were the two worst conductors?  What is your evidence?
5. Do you think water is a good or poor conductor?  Why?
   
6. Why do you think it matters which material is a good or bad conductor?  How do we use conductors in our life?

Answers:

1. The heat energy went from the hot plate to the jar, from the jar to the water, from the water to the sticks, and from the sticks into the butter, which melted.
2. The results were nothing like my predictions! This is a comparison of my results and the predictions.

          My Prediction       |            Results
___________________________________________
Wood         2nd               |               5th
Aluminum   1st               |               2nd
Plastic        5th               |              4th
Copper       3rd               |               1st
Brass          4th               |               3rd

  3.    The 2 best conductors were the copper and the          aluminum because they were the first 2 to slide.
  4.    The 2 worst conductors were the plastic and the           bamboo wood because they were the last ones to          slide.
  5.    I think water is a good conductor because,outside          of this experiment, I know that, if you put a hair          dryer in a bathtub, the electrical energy can                  spread very quickly through the water.
  6.    I think it matters which materials are good and             bad conductors because, if you end up being a          someone that uses wires, you may need to know          which materials are good conductors and poor              conductors so, when you work with something              electrical, you want to know which tools won't              electrocute you as easily when you touch the              wires with them.

Argument 1: We should declare independence because England is making us pay extra money, and we don't want to.
Argument 2: We should declare independence because we don't want dangerous things like the Boston Massacre to happen again.
Argument 3: We should declare independence because we don't want all the laws to end up as something worse than they already have. 

Argument 1: We shouldn't declare independence because we don't know how to govern ourselves properly.
Argument 2: We shouldn't declare independence because that would cause a war, and the war would cost a lot of money, and make us all poor.
Argument 3: We shouldn't declare independence because Britain has good reasons for passing all of these laws, and it will get better when their debt is paid.