This term, Primary 5 – 7 are participating in a series of workshops organised by the Glasgow Science Centre, where we will be exploring the future of energy.
Through investigation of renewables technologies and the pathway to net zero, our pupils will discover opportunities in the energy sector and explore how their skills could change the world.
Our first learning experience focussed on electricity generation by wind turbines. The blades of a turbine rotate when they are moved by the wind. The slow rotation of the turbine blades can be transformed into a fast rotation needed for a generator.
To model this process, we created gears of different circumferences. We aligned them on boards so the cog teeth interlocked when turned. We were able to predict and test the direction of travel of each gear (clockwise or anti-clockwise). We also calculated the r.p.m. of the gears to identify the increase in rotation rate from the larger to the smaller gears. We used observation with a digital stopwatch, compared results and calculated our class average r.p.m. to make a fair test.
# Successful Learners
