workshop

On Monday, we welcomed John to our class who brought with him a vast range of magnets, activities and experiments for the children to witness.We first started by looking at a range of different magnets, including button, bar, horseshoe and neodymium magnets. The neodymium magnets were so strong that we all had difficulty pulling them apart.

The children then went on to find the north and south poles on magnets. This was done using a compass. When a magnet was put towards a compass, if the compass then turned to

Today, we welcomed John Parkin into oupoint north or south, it showed what pole of the magnet was facing the compass.

After this, the children used magnets and iron filings to see the magnetic fields produced by the different magnets. They also used the magnets to check which metals were magnetic. Surprisingly, we found that most metals aren’t actually magnetic like we previously thought.

Finally, we looked at the different applications of magnets. This included magnetic braking in roller coasters, magnetic propulsion in cars and trains, and magnetic levitation used to help melt metals. We discussed the process of creating electromagnets as well.