We often start off thinking about stuff that interests us…….
Which for me and my son is normally science fiction related. Our brainstorming took us down the route of space, space travel, far-off galaxies, aliens, and distant planets.
Before starting, we had a little think about how we want to learn. This involves A-11 having a look at a brainstorming map and deciding how we could do today’s lesson. This brain map has on it – blogs, ChatGPT, YouTube videos, practice questions, practice what I know, and ask someone – just generic terms. This enables him to think a little how he learns best and also for me for future reference.
After deciding that we would be interested in lenses and telescopes, we decided that working out the size of circles is essential for measuring planet sizes, telescopes and lenses.
We got a little sidetracked trying to work out the mass of things (like giant planets / suns) as we thought about how we would apply the area of a circle to work out the mass of a sphere……thanks chat GPT.
So we looked at the volumes of objects using the cubed method. Applying this to volumes of objects made of different materials like lithium, sulphur, iron or lead – these all had different masses but would be the same size. Mass equal density x volume.
Moving onto telescope lenses, we thought we may be able to see an alien race on Proxima Centuri light years away if we had a ginormous telescope so we reviewed the formula for working out the area in metres squared of a circular lens. We worked out the area of some circles which was a fun way to do it. This is:
It was a very easy lesson, involved very little planning, but once you get the imagination going and thinking how circles are applied in biology, medicine, technology and space, it’s very easy to stimulate the mind of a 11-year-old and also his father.
Applications of volumes / masses / areas:
- Microscopes
- Telescopes
- Lenses
- Planets
- Solar panels
- Planets
- Meteorites
Formulas
- Volumes
- Mass
- Area
- Radius
- Pi
- Density
- Weight
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