We look through the microscope. Master class on using a microscope

We have a microscope at home, but although I am a biologist, I know him firsthand, I spent a lot of time looking at all kinds of preparations, the children have never had close contact with him. It seems that there is nothing complicated in this, no special tools are needed, but, come on, you still have not been able to introduce your children to the cell - the basis of all living things. Well, nothing, today I filled this gap in the education of my older children, its results are below.

So, we needed:

• microscope - I have a good, albeit rather shabby microscope with three objectives: eight times, forty times and ninety times; the last of them will not be needed - we will not look at bacteria, and I don’t have immersion oil; we will use the remaining two;
• glass slide and cover glass - I have one of both, this is quite enough;
• clean water - very little is needed;
• iodine - I will color the preparation with it, since I don’t have special dyes, but you can do without dyes at all;
• onion head - you can take a very small or even spoiled one, a tiny piece of film is required;
• scalpel - can be replaced with a knife for cutting paper, at worst, a kitchen one will do;
• tweezers - it is convenient for them to remove the film from the bow, but you can simply pick it up with your fingers;
• needles - one larger (I added water to the preparation), the second is smaller (this one can be manipulated under a microscope);
• child - we will show him everything, I took two.

Cut out a piece of juicy onion scales and peel off a small film from it with tweezers.

The film is placed on the center of the washed and carefully wiped glass slide.

Now we cut the film with tweezers so that a very small piece remains, a large uncut film forms folds, it will be inconvenient to examine it.

Now we drip water on the film (7 drops) and cover with a coverslip.

Coloring. Place a drop of iodine at the junction of the coverslip and slide.

Iodine will gradually penetrate under the glass and color the preparation. Depending on the situation, water or iodine can be added. It will turn out something like this.

The temporary preparation is ready. We put it on the subject table. Set up the lighting (I rotate the mirror at the base of the microscope so that the beam of light reflected from the table lamp hits the preparation). Then, looking into the eyepiece and rotating the main screw (I have the largest one), we ensure that the image is in the best focus, that is, as sharp as possible. Now we move the preparation, looking into the eyepiece, choosing the best picture.

Everything is ready, we arrange the child in front of the microscope so that he can look into the eyepiece while sitting.