Thermal Energy

Thermal Energy Unit

Below you will find links to each of our class presentations. These can be used to help students review information that has been presented in class throughout the unit. While these presentations do not fully capture the material covered in class, they can be used as a tool to reinforce key concepts.

Chapter 1-

During this unit, students take on the role of student thermal scientists helping the principal of Riverdale School choose a new heating system for his school. The principal is deciding between two heating systems: a water heater system that uses a small amount of warmer water, and a ground water system that uses a large amount of cooler water. In this chapter, students investigate temperature at the molecular level and come to understand that an increase in the temperature of the air inside a school is really an increase in how fast its molecules are moving.

Lesson 1.1- WE DID NOT COMPLETE THE PRE-ASSESSMENT.

Lesson 1.2- Investigating Hot and Cold (Class Slides)
- Lesson 1.2- Full Youtube Video
- Lesson 1.2- Thermal Energy- Investigating Hot and Cold Things- Video

Lesson 1.3- Temperature and Motion
- Lesson 1.3- Full Youtube Video

Lesson 1.4-Molecules and Temperature
- Lesson 1.4- Full Youtube Video
- Lesson 1.4- Jamboard Activity

Chapter 2-

In this chapter, students continue to build an understanding of how heating systems that use warm water could warm the air in the school. Students explore why changes in temperature occur, and learn that changes in molecular motion correspond to changes in kinetic energy of molecules. Using this knowledge, students observe that kinetic energy transfers between things in contact, moving from the faster-moving molecules of hotter things to the slower-moving molecules of colder things.

Lesson 2.1- Visualizing Motion Energy
- Lesson 2.1- Full Youtube Video

Lesson 2.2- How Air Conditioners Make Cities Hotter."
- Lesson 2.2- Full Youtube Video

Lesson 2.3- Analyzing Evidence and Evaluating Claims
- Lesson 2.3- Full Youtube Video

Lesson 2.4- Investigating Energy Transfer
- Lesson 2.4- Energy Cube Model
- Lesson 2.4- Full Youtube Video

Lesson 2.5- Explaining Changes in Temperature
- Lesson 2.5- Jamboard Activity
- Lesson 2.5- Full Youtube Video

Lesson 2.6- Critical Juncture Assessment

Lesson 2.7- Revisiting Energy and Molecules

Chapter 3-

In this chapter, students explore the effect that the number of molecules making up the things in a system has on temperature change. They learn that a thing with more molecules can have a greater total kinetic energy than a thing with fewer molecules, despite being at the same or a lower temperature, and that more kinetic energy must transfer to change the temperature of a thing with more molecules.

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