Charge It! All About Electrical Attraction and Repulsion
Students engage in the science and engineering practice of asking questions as they use balloons to perform simple experiments to make sense of the phenomena of static electricity and charge polarization. As they attract and repel objects with their charged balloons, students explore the disciplinary core idea of electronic and magnetic forces and the crosscutting concept of cause and effect.
The basic structure of an atomCopyright California Energy Commission http://www.energyquest.ca.gov/story/chapter02.html
Engineers make everyone happy: Environmental and electrical engineers design industrial air filters (such as electrostatic precipitators) that remove harmful pollutants from factory air without slowing down the production of the plant. Implementation of this technology has resulted in cleaner emissions into the air we breathe, from power plants, steel mills and other manufacturing and industrial processes and factories. Engineers can do this because they study static electricity and understand what is happening at the very tiny level of electrical charges, which are too small to see.
After this activity, students should be able to:
- Describe how to charge an insulator (such as a balloon).
- Explain what physical change occurs when an object is charged.
- Recognize that charged objects can stick to neutral insulators.
- Recognize that engineers must understand the concept of static electricity