Water is matter

Although water is a very common substance, it is an unusuall substance.

In order to understand just how unique water is, we must first understand what all of the things around us are made of.

All of the things you can see are matter.

Matter is anything that takes up space and has weight.

Your desk and your books are matter.

Since your body has weight and takes up space, it is matter also.

There are real things that are not made of matter like ideas and love.

All matter is made up of tiny particles called molecules.

A molecule is the smallest piece of a substance that still has all qualities of that substance.

The smallest particle of water is a water molecule.

Water molecules are very tiny.

If you could line up 60 million molecules of water side by side, they would reach across the face of a penny.

Do you think you could see a molecule of water?

If a molecule of water is broken down into smaller particles, the particles are no longer water.

The particles which make up molecules are called atoms.

Atoms are so small that there are 500 billion trillion atoms in every teaspoonful of water.

A water molecule is made of hydrogen and oxygen atoms.

Every water molecules is made of two atoms of hydrogen and one atom of oxygen.

Hydrogen and Oxygen are gases found in the air

When two atoms of hydrogen and one atom of oxygen join together, they make a molecule of water.

During the process of photosynthesis, a leaf uses the energy of sunlight to split water molecules into atoms of hydrogen and atoms of oxygen.

The leaf uses the hydrogen to make simple sugars by combining it whith carbon dioxide from the air.

Sugar is made of carbon, oxygen, and hydrogen.

The plant releases extra oxygen into the air, where it can be breathed by people and animals.