Figure it out! Students were given brief instructions on what to do with the materials on their desk. Groups of four were separated into pairs:
Experimenters - perform the experiment
Researchers - use the internet to find what experiment they are attempting.
Prior to the experiment, students drew pictures of the lab materials in their science notebooks and predicted what was going to happen. After the experiment, students re-designed their pictures and procedures (if necessary) to accurately describe the experiment as well as a write up on what is chromatography.
While initially hesitant and unsure of what to do, students soon began using key words from applicable materials and processes being accomplished to discover that they were performing a chromatography lab.