This curriculum unit allows students to become quality control testers and determine the amount of Ca2+ in Tang® and Mg(OH)2 in milk of magnesia through the use of acid/base titrations. Students will standardize three solutions that will be used in detecting the ions and will learn about titrations, indicators, pH and pH meters and the preparation of solutions, all included in a Regents curriculum. These experiments were designed for use by high school chemistry classes, either Regents or AP.

This curriculum gives students a chance to see how solutions are analyzed in a chemical setting. Not only do students learn about titrations, but they use simple chemistry to determine if product labels accurately represent the contents of the package. This set of labs uses easily accessible or inexpensive chemicals and is safe to do in most laboratory settings.

The unit was developed/modified by Tamara Hanna, a graduate student in chemistry at Cornell University and was adapted from a lab written by Dr. Burnaby Munson, University of Delaware, for Quantitative Chemistry I. The lab was piloted in March 2005 with three mini-sections of Regents chemistry students taught by Pat Carroll at Newark Valley High School, and two sections of honors chemistry students taught by Mary Kay Hickey at Dryden High School.

Downloadable WORD files:

Teacher's Guide

Student Version