1. Electricity
While initially hard to fully understand, I found this topic the most interesting of the entire year. I really enjoyed talking about this because electronics are so common in our lives today, so actually learning about things applicable in my life was a blast. Learning about light bulbs and how houses were wired was very useful. I learned that you want your house to be wired in a parallel circuit so that if one appliance blows, the others will keep working, where they would all blow in a series circuit. I found this helpful as I now know why all the other appliances in my house keep working if a bulb blows.
2. Charges
I found the topic of charges surprisingly interesting. I really liked the big question that came along with this topic; why does our hair stand up after taking a sweater or hat off? I enjoyed how this was a relevant question in my life because I have had this happen before. I learned that the hat steals electrons from your hair as you take it off, and the like charges in your hair repel. Since your hair is light enough to stand up, it does when the charges repel.
3. Magnetism
This recent topic was another interesting one for me. I once again enjoyed the relevance of the material we were learning, and I have always found magnets interesting. While some of the specifics were not the most interesting, I liked learning about how credit cards work. I learned that the card has a magnetic strip with a code on the back with different levels of magnetism. When you swipe it, the card reader has coils that induces a voltage/current and detects the different levels of magnetism, ultimately sending this to a computer which translates the code. I found this very interesting and applicable.
4. Motors
I found motors to be interesting also because they are very relevant and useful in almost everyone's life. They are in cars, toys, and a countless number of other things. I learned that a motor is made up of two coils and magnets and they convert electrical energy to mechanical energy. It uses the coils and the magnets with an electric field to convert this energy. Actually making a motor was interesting as well, and I found this helpful yet engaging as I would encounter many motors later in my life.
5. Machines
Learning about machines was neat. I never realized how useful a simple machine like a ramp or pulley actually is until I learned about them. I learned that when using a ramp, the force is actually the same if you push a box up a ramp or just lift the box up. The difference is that the force is split up so that you don't have to exert all your force at once. This is what actually makes something like a ramp quite useful in our lives.
6. Newton's 1st Law
This was the very first topic we learned about in physics. Having never taken physics before this, it was very a very interesting topic to start off with. Newton's 1st Law states, "An object in motion will stay in motion, and an object at rest will stay at rest unless acted on by an outside force." It seemed simple enough, but when we talked about real world examples I actually understood it. I learned that the objects on a table will stay at rest when you pull the tablecloth out because of Newtons' first law.
7. Torque
Torque was confusing at first, but after learning more about it and it's applications, I had a much easier time understanding it. I even understood it well enough that Nolan, Walker, and I made a rap for our podcast about torque. I learned that torque=force x lever arm, and that this is helpful when talking about opening doors. Since the hinges of a door are far away, this creates a long lever arm and therefore requires only a small amount of force to exerted when opening the door. I found this interesting and helpful as I opened doors a lot, however I never thought of why the hinges were where they are.
8. The Earth's Magnetic Field
Similar to magnetism, but more specific in regards to earth's magnetic field. I really enjoyed learning about our planet's magnetic field because I learned several things I had not known before. The most interesting thing I learned was that the north and south of earth are the geometric directions, and not magnetic. The north pole is actually the magnetic south pole and the south pole is actually the magnetic north pole. This was a very interesting fact I learned from this topic. I will use this knowledge later in life by telling people and surprising (hopefully) them.
9. Magnetic Paper Clip
This is another sub-topic under magnetism, but I really enjoyed magnetism so I will keep writing more about it. I found the question of how a paper clip can be turned into a magnet interesting. I learned that the paper clip originally has unaligned domains, but when it is moved near a magnet, the paper clip's domains align. The paper clip now has a north and south pole, and when it is moved next to the magnet, it will attract because the poles will be opposite.
10. Work
No, not work on homework. Work is a topic we learned about along with power. Doing work on something means that you are exerting a force on it, and we generally connected this with carrying things. For example, the question "When you are holding/lifting a 10kg box and carrying it forward with you over 10m, how much work are you doing on the box?" This is a trick question, because you aren't actually doing any work on the box because of the fact that if the forces are parallel then no work is done. It was slightly confusing, but after I understood it, it was helpful and interesting.
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