Topics

Magnets and forces

Simple activities around attraction and repelling magnets and finding which materials are magnetic. Model lorries help to tell the story of recycling metals in scrapyards and this leads to the advantages of using electromagnets. These are often very strong as we find by staging a tug of war! Other forces studied include friction, gravity and upthrust.

Sound

Vibrations are demonstrated by bouncing balls and laser beams. This is followed by the use of a sound analyser. Children get the chance to make very pure sounds and find out more about the different sounds given out by various musical instruments.

Light

Light experiments include laser reflections and looking at different sources of light including the plasma ball. There are also simpler demos for KS1 such as shadows and colour filters which thay always enjoy.

Space

Space uses various in-house models of the solar sysytem to punch home all those orbits that define our time on earth. With the help of liquid nitrogen, we explore the cold unhospitable regions of our solar syatem. On the way, tomatoes are frozen, dry ice appears inside a balloon of Mars air and a Big Bang reminds us how it all started! Missile and rocket launches accompany thoughts of leaving earth, partly achieved but with an interesting future.

Electricity

To add to the important batteries and bulbs, we look at how electricity is made including bicycle dynamos and solar cells. There is a light buggy problem to solve and then we finish with the ever popular Van de Graaff and some hair-raising fun!

Railway science

This session is a cross-curricular workshop using G scale model railway to cover some science topics such as gravity, friction, forces and magnets. We use examples of gravity shunting, electromagnet crane work and recycling. Also springs are used to compare pulling power. Some transport history exercises are available to go with this workshop

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