Fifth and Sixth Grade Vocabulary Pages with Definitions and Sentences 5th and 6th Grade Vocabulary Pages

Science Vocabulary List 05/23/05

1. Accelerate - Speed up

2. Accelerator - A machine that speeds up charged particles to higher energy levels

3. Atom - The smallest unit of a chemical element, made up of a nucleus surrounded by electrons

4. Beam - A ray of light, a group of particles traveling together along a well-defined path

5. Celsius - A temperature scale on which water freezes at zero degrees and boils at 100 degrees

6. Charge - The amount of electricity carried by a body ( a charge can be negative, like an electron, or positive, like a proton.

Objects with opposite charges attract one another while objects with the same charge repel

each other.)

7. Repel - Push away

8. Attract - Pull together

9. Change - To become different, to react

10. Property - A characteristic

11. Reaction - To change, to become different

12. Circuit - A closed path through which electric current flows

13. Compound - A substance composed of two or more elements, such as water (H2O), carbon dioxide (CO2), or table sugar

(C12H22O11)

14. Computer - A programmable machine that inputs, processes, and outputs data

15. Mean - The sum of the items in a set of data divided by the number of items in the set; the average (The mean of

{1,1,1,2,4,6,6} is (1+1+1+2+4+6+6) divided by 7 = 3.

16. Median - The middle number of a set of ordered data (The median of {111,2,4,6,6} is 2 since 2 is the middle number when

all of the numbers are placed in order. If there are an even number of numbers (no middle) two middle numbers

are the median.)

17. Microscope - An optical (visual) instrument that uses a combination of lenses to make very small objects look bigger

18. Mixture - A substance composed of two or more components, each of which retains its own properties (A salad is a

mixture of vegetables)

19. Mode - The data item that occurs most often in a set of data (The mode of {1,1,1,2,4,6,6} is 1 because 1 is the number that

occurs most often.

20. Molecule - Two or more elements that are chemically joined (Water is a molecule made of two atoms of Hydrogen and one

atom of Oxygen.)

21. Negative - Having a minus charge (Negative charges are attracted to positive charges and are repelled by other negative

charges.)

22. Neutral - Having no charge or equal positive and negative values