This week in science we started learning about the digestive system. So of course, we started with the mouth. In the mouth we have our jaw, teeth, tongue, and saliva. Now, most of us probably know what our jaw, teeth, and tongue do. But, saliva is more that just stuff that builds up when you smell or see something good or sour. What saliva does is break up the starches in our food, and it turns them into simple sugars, so our bodies can use them. Our saliva also moistens our food, so we can chew it all up and it will slide down our digestive tract smoother, so remember kids, alway chew your food thoroughly before swallowing. So, to show us how our saliva works, Shane had us do an experiment. We were all given partners and two saltines, then one of us had to chew one of the saltines for 3 minutes, while the other one just crumbled the other one. My partner was Stella, and I was the chewer. While I was chewing it got really smooth and liquidy, I’m sorry this sound so gross, then after 3 minutes was up I spit it into a beaker that had 30 milliliters of water in it. The chewed saltine was so grossly smooth, there wasn’t a single chunk in it and Stella poured the crumbled cracker into the other beaker with 30 milliliters in it. Then, Shane came and put two drops of iodine in both beakers, iodine turns purple in the presence of starch. Stella’s beaker turned dark purple, and mine was a light pink, because my saliva broke the starches down into simple sugars. Overall this experiment was fun and gross, especially the texture of 3 minute chewed saltine. Thank You for reading this disgusting blog!

What causes iodine to change color?

How much starch is in a Saltine cracker?

Would it have turned the same color if I had chewed it for a smaller amount of time?