Incorporating Starbursts Into Science Lab At Stone Middle School

Using Starbursts candy, students in Callie Johnson’s sixth-grade class at Stone Middle School have a better understanding of the rock cycle as they pass through a series of simulation activities.

To model the rock cycle, students were given different colors of Starburst candies and asked to cut them into pieces using scissors. The small pieces represented sedimentary rock. When pushed together and warmed up with their hands, the candies began to resemble metamorphic rock. Warming them up further, they become softer and more pliable like magma. As the Starbursts cooled and hardened, the candies were similar to an igneous rock. The hands-on lab experiment was a lesson that rocks make up the earth and are constantly changing into other forms with the processes of nature.