PHYSICAL SCIENCE, EARTH AND SPACE SCIENCE
Use what you learn about solar energy to save the school dance from vampires in this super cool solar energy game. Collect energy during the day using solar panels to ward off the vampires at night. Consider sun angle, tilt, shadows and time of year to maximize your energy collection - good luck!

ABOUT THE SCIENCE
Did you know only absorbed light can be converted to electricity? What ways can you use the electricity that is converted from solar panels?
Using solar energy in your home or business has a lot of benefits: it is free, clean, and infinitely renewable. It also reduces utility costs, increases energy self-reliance, and is extremely reliable. So, how does it work?
Solar energy uses the direct conversion of light into electricity at the atomic level (photovoltaic cells) to generate electricity from solar energy and this process is called the photoelectric effect. Materials absorb photons of light and release electrons. When electrons are captured, an electric current results that can be used as electricity in our homes.
Before we get the electricity in our homes, there are a variety of factors that need to be considered with solar energy: solar altitude or height of the sun and the angle throughout the day, and keeping solar panels shadow free are just a few.

In this project, students will use knowledge of electricity and electromagnetism to collaboratively design and test a model of a magnetic recycling sorter. They will evaluate the performance of their models and propose further modifications based on the output of their magnetic device measured in mT using a Vernier probe. They will also physically test their magnets on a model of a conveyor belt containing recyclable items. Students will track their data from both tests, with the ultimate goal of creating the strongest and most effective magnet with given materials. Finally, students will present their findings and proposed final design to peers and community partners involved in the recycling industry. The entire process takes about 6 weeks. The unit is a great fit for standards within energy and engineering & design.

Today we’re talking all about fluid mechanics! We’ll look at different scales that we work with as engineers, mass and energy transfers, the no-slip condition, stress and strain, Newton’s law of viscosity, Reynold’s number, and more!

This week we’re exploring aerospace engineering and its two main fields: aeronautical engineering and astronautical engineering. We’ll explore life & buoyancy, propulsion systems, and the challenges of managing the human body in space.

So when water evaporates, what happens? Where does that water go? Does just vanish? Is it no more? Can matter ever just go away? Well, the answer is no, it can't. But it can LOOK like it does. In this episode of Crash Course Kids, Sabrina shows us how Conservation of Mass actually works with Sugar and Water.

In our first episode of Crash Course Engineering, Shini explains what engineering is, and gives a brief overview of its four main branches (civil, mechanical, electrical, and chemical) as well as a look at some of the other fields of engineering.

What's MATTER? In this episode of Crash Course Kids, Sabrina talks about what matter is and the three states of matter: Solid, Liquid, and Gas. She also does a quick experiment that you can do at home to prove that air is matter.

What exactly can we tell about an unknown substance by it's properties. We already know that a substance is matter that’s made of one kind of atom or molecule, and that has specific properties and that some substances are elements, which means they can’t be broken down into other substances through physical changes or chemical reactions. We also know that we can group substances and elements by their properties. We know that metals have high reflectivity and magnetivity. What else do we know about metals?

There are batteries powering so many parts of our everyday lives, so today we’re going to talk about how they work and how we can make them better. We’ll explain how they provide power by discharging ions between a cathode and an anode, and how reversing that process gives us a way of charging them. We’ll also look at how that batteries deliver voltage differently over time, leading to discharge curves, and some of the work being done to improve the properties of batteries for portable electronics.

We’ve introduced the 0th and 1st laws of thermodynamics, so now it’s time to move on to the second law and how we came to understand it. We’ll explain the differences between the first and second law, and we’ll talk about the Carnot cycle and why we can never design a perfectly efficient engine.

In this episode of Crash Course Kids, Sabrina talks about how properties help us understand objects.