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Mole Day at Calvin Christian
By: Catherine Herrel
The Chemistry students in Mr.
Steenstra’s class at Calvin Christian school in Escondido,
celebrated Mole Day on January 9th, 2008, as it was
postponed due to the San Diego Wild Fires. Mole Day is based on
the mole, which is a unit of mass that has the equivalency of
the atomic or molecular mass of a substance, expressed in grams.
The mole, which is 6.02x1023 molecules or atoms of a
substance, was discovered by Amadeo Avogadro. Now, Mole Day is
celebrated by many chemists, and evidently, students.
The students started out by joining
together for an IHOP breakfast at 6:02 in the morning before
heading to school to begin their activities. Participating
students could engage in a number of activities to earn points.
The student with the most points wins a Mole Day t-shirt.
 
Students could wear a pin with a
mole on it around school in recognition of this special event.
Chemistry students brought in foods with names like “tootsie
moles” and “cinnamon moles”. During class, students could read
poems, sing a song, or tell jokes relating to Mole Day, while
the others played “Pin the Nose on the Mole”. A competition was
held for all those who wanted to join in for the
“Mole-from-a-Mole” game. The students were given 27 grams (or
one mole) of aluminum foil and were asked to make a model of the
mole and each class got to vote on their favorite mole.
The halls were decorated with many
colorful posters with jokes, pictures, and explanations about
Mole Day. Balloons with a cartoon on them were given to the
students and filled the Chemistry classroom. Students had
decorated t-shirts and binders in honor of the mole. “Mole Day
was really fun and cool! I was really happy that Mole Day was
postponed instead of canceled,” said Katerina Montalvo as she
laughed and relayed her favorite parts of Mole Day.
 The
students not only learned a lot by trying to guess the number of
moles in a container of pennies, salt, and water, but also had
an immense amount of fun as they celebrated together. “It was
amazing! The Mole-from-a-Mole game was really creative and I had
a blast!” Annabelle Kraus exclaimed. Clearly, Mole Day was a big
hit with the Chemistry students and for Mr. Steenstra as well.
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