Cabbage Juice Lab

So, I referred to cabbage juice being an indicator the other day in my post about using iodine as an indicator for starch.

Red cabbage juice makes a great indicator for acids and bases. All you need to do is take a head or even half to one quarter of a head of cabbage juice and boil it. What's left behind is a whole lot of purple cabbage juice.

Using an egg carton or paint palette or container with a few wells for holding liquids, you can fill the wells with substances to test. Using an eye dropper, you put a few drops if the cabbage juice in the well and wait for a color change.

The color change will be pronounced and immediate. In the presence of an acid, the color will turn to bright pink. The weaker the acid the less pink it will be. Purple or no change means the substance has a neutral pH. Blue indicates a weak base and green is a strong base.

This is a really fun one for kids and gives them more practice with a pipette or eye dropper.

Acid or Base
My embedded document here was inspired by Michelle at Delightful Learning who uses them with her Instant Challenges. I printed one off and plan to link up one day soon, but I had try the embedding. Thanks for using Scribd Michelle. It rocks.