This morning we finished our explorations of light energy by studying shadows. We learned how shadows can tell us what time of day and season it is. We went to worldclock.com to see how the surface of the earth is divided into night and day. We even made a human sundial before walking over to Wilson hall for lunch. Before that, however, we shifted gears and started to investigate heat energy. We learned how heat is transferred through solids liquids and gases. We also made a claim that heat energy and temperature are two different concepts. We found quantifiable evidence to back up this claim by using our "speedometers" to measure the molecular motion of liquids in two different beakers. One beaker had more heat energy because it had more heated liquid. Our next topic in phriendly physics was electricity. Static was our first exploration but we soon learned that a humid August day was not the optimum time to study static electricity. We used an energy ball to model an open and closed circuit. Then we used bulbs and batteries and motors to make our own series and parallel circuits. We wrapped up our lab experience by stacking 9 volt batteries to light up strings of Christmas lights.
Our day ended with a very informative tour by David Harding who is the Deputy Head of Fermilab's Technical Division. We learned how this critical component of fermilab makes, calibrates and tests the magnets for high energy physics.
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