Teach Students About Taste Areas of the Tongue

Did you ever stop to think about the food you’re eating? Maybe you like how it tastes or notice the different ways you can taste it. Well, you have about 10,000 taste buds on your tongue, and they can pick up 5 different kinds of taste: sweet, sour, salty, bitter, and savory. But where are these taste receptors on your tongue? In this experiment, you’ll find out!
Question
Do different areas of the tongue taste certain things better? Taste areas of the tongue lesson for students
Materials

Around 8 to 10 subjects.
Salt
Lemon juice
Sugar
Soy sauce
Five clean cups
Black coffee
Masking tape
2 spoons
Water
Permanent marker
Cup of water for each test subject
Q-tips
Trash can

Procedure

You’ll need test subjects first. Make sure none of your subjects are allergic to the foods you have.
Label your cups “Sweet”, “Salty”, “Savory”, “Sour”, and “Bitter”.
Time to make a salty solution. Pour ¼ cup of water into your cup labeled “Salty” and add in two tablespoons of salt. Stir this up.
The sugary solution. Pour ¼ cup of water into your “Sweet” cup, then add 2 tablespoons of sugar and stir.
Add 2 tablespoons of lemon juice into your “Sour” cup. Add 2 tablespoons of soy sauce into the “Savory” cup; add 2 tablespoons of cold, black coffee into the “Bitter” cup.
Have a diagram of the different taste areas and show it to your volunteers before they begin.
Tell them they will be taking a Q-tip soaked in the salty solution to the different taste zones on their tongue. They will be able to tell which one tastes the saltiest this way.
Place a Q-tip in the salty solution for each of your subjects.
Let your test subject taste the salty solution in the taste zones and ask where they tasted the most salt. Don’t let the others hear any of the answers.
Make a table for your information.
Give your subject some water in-between taste tests.
Repeat the process with the other solutions.

Results
Every subject will likely be different. Where one person tastes salty things, another may not taste the same strength. It all depends on the person and where their taste receptors are. While it may be frustrating not getting a definite answer, your subjects will learn a lot about their own tastes and you’ll get to do a fun experiment.

Science fair project for 3rd, 4th, 5th, 6th grade students.