Question

because coats are generally worn to keep warm, student a wanted to see what would happen if he put a coat on something cold, such as a snowman. he waited for a day when there was snow on the ground, but temperatures were expected to get above freezing. he built two identical snowmen (same mass) and only put a coat on one. after student a put the coat on the snowman, he measured how much snow melted into water every fifteen minutes for one hour on each snowman. (he was able to measure the amount by building the snowmen on a platform that would catch the water but not affect their melting rate.) look at his data table below and complete the cer.

data table

snowman	after 15 minutes	after 30 minutes	after 45 minutes	after 60 minutes
no coat	60 ml	125 ml	279 ml	402 ml

question: does putting a coat on a snowman have an effect on how fast it melts?

claim (answers the question): __________

evidence (observations/data): __________

reasoning (connect the claim and evidence using science – why does this make sense?):

Explanation:

Answer:

Claim: Putting a coat on a snowman slows down its melting rate.
Evidence: After 15 minutes, the snowman with a coat melted 10 ml while the one without melted 60 ml; after 30 minutes, 25 ml vs. 125 ml; after 45 minutes, 55 ml vs. 279 ml; after 60 minutes, 78 ml vs. 402 ml. The snowman without a coat always melted more snow into water than the one with a coat at each time interval.
Reasoning: Coats are insulators, meaning they reduce the transfer of heat. Since melting requires heat (energy) to change solid snow to liquid water, the coat reduces the amount of heat reaching the snowman, thus slowing the melting process. The data shows less water (from melted snow) for the snowman with the coat, supporting that the coat insulates and slows melting.