worksheets - the inventors

THE INVENTORS

ADVENTURE PACK

WORKSHEETS

(Group is assumed to be 30 pupils)

Print out the pupil file

Story part 1: The miner

Assignment 1: Draw a geothermal house

Assignment 2: The geothermal solar tower

Story part 2: Salt electricity

Assignment 3: The energy of a lemon

Assignment 4: Salt production

TEACHER FILE WORKSHEET 2:

THE JOURNEY

AND THE WHEEL OF THE SUN

Teacher Worksheet 2: THE JOURNEY2

Simon has taken a good look at the postcards. In a book he found a

picture of a coal mine. It is exactly the same mine as the one on George’s

postcard. Simon drives the car and Aisha reads the map. In the distance

they can see a big tower. Enormous wheels hang at the top of the tower.

‘Exactly like on the postcard’, yells Aisha. Simon stops the car at the tower

with the strange wheels. They get out.

‘What are the wheels for?’ Aisha wonders.

‘There’s a lift attached to the wheels that can take you down for hundreds

of metres, deep under the ground’, Simon explains. ‘There’s coal down

there. Starting from a shaft, miners dig long tunnels so that they can get to

the coal.’

‘What’s going on here?’

Aisha and Simon jump. An older man is walking towards them.

‘There’s nothing for you here. The mines have been closed for years’, he

says in a cold voice. Aisha shows the old man the postcard.

‘Look, I got this card from someone we’re looking for. His name’s George’

The man looks at the card and on the back sees a drawing of a lion. Next to

it is says ‘For Aisha’.

‘Oh, you mean George the lion tamer’, the man says. His voice has become

friendly.

Aisha nods delightedly. ‘Do you know him?’

‘Of course. He was interested in the treasure hidden in this old coal mine.’

The man looks secretive.

‘Do you mean the coal?’ asks Simon, picking a black stone up off the

ground.

The man takes the stone from Simon’s hands and rubs it. The stone gives

off its colour and the man’s hands turn black.

‘This stone comes from the time of the dinosaurs. It isn’t a stone; it’s wood.

PART 1:

THE INVENTORS AND THE WHEEL OF THE SUN (±15 MIN.)

THE MINER


Very old wood. It burns well. You can fire the stove with it. And if you put a

pot of water near the stove, it will heat the water. And if you pump that hot

water through your house you have heating.’

‘Sounds complicated, muses Aisha.

The old man nods. ‘It is complicated. It could be a lot simpler. I’ll show

you.’

Aisha and Simon follow the man to the old tower.

‘My name’s Gerard. I used to dig here for coal,’ he says.

When they’re inside, Gerard hands Aisha and Simon a mining helmet, an oil

lamp and a pair of boots. They step into the lift.

‘Now I guard the galleries to ensure that no one gets into my mine.

It’s very dangerous here.’

‘Don’t you mind, being all alone in the dark?’ asks Aisha.

Gerard smiles. ‘It’s not so bad. I’m used to it. I’ve been under the ground

for years.

And I’m not on my own today, but together with you two.’

‘Much more fun isn’t it?’ says Aisha.

The miner laughs.

Then the lift comes to a halt and Gerard says softly: ‘I’ve discovered

something very important.

It’s still a secret, but I’ll show you.’

The lift doors open. It’s pitch black in the tunnel. Gerard lights an old oil

lamp. Together they wander through the complicated system of passages

where the miners used to dig for coal.

‘They dug the coal out of the ground with pickaxes. Later they used

machines’, Gerard explains. ‘You have to be awfully careful here, he warns.

‘If you lose your way, that’s it. Look, there it is.’

Gerard points to a sport where the tunnel is a little wider. There is a large

pool of water on the right.

‘Put your hand in the water’, Gerard says to Simon.

‘The water’s really hot. How is that possible?’ asks Simon.

‘Good isn’t it? Discovered it myself. So why bother to burn coal to heat

water for your heating?’ Gerard asks Aisha. ‘Not necessary at all. The water

is already hot.’

Aisha sticks her hand in the water too.


‘How’s that possible?’ Aisha also wonders.

‘Do you know that the inside of the Earth is red hot?’ asks Gerard.

‘The deeper under the ground you go, the closer you get to the heat’, he

explains.

‘The water down here heats up by itself. You don’t have to burn any coal for

that. The only thing you need is a very deep hole.’

‘Cool’, Aisha exclaims enthusiastically.

‘No, not cool: hot, says Gerard.

‘Yea, yea, hot. I get it’, says Aisha.

Gerard points to a pipe that runs through the tunnel. ‘See this pipe?’

‘I pump the hot water to my house through this old pipe. And with the hot

water...’

Aisha finishes his sentence. ‘…you can take a shower.’

Gerard grimaces. ‘No, yuck! That dirty water? It doesn’t bear thinking

about. I use it for the heating.’

‘What’s more...’ Gerard whispers as if he’s giving away a big secret.

‘I’m working on a machine’, Gerard continues.

Toink. Just when Gerard wants to tell them about his machine there is a

strange noise in the distance.

‘What was that?’ Aisha and Simon call out.

‘No idea. We’d better go and take a look, replies Gerard.

The three of them walk back to the lift. Aisha and Simon would have got

lost already if they’d been on their own. Luckily Gerard is there with them

and he knows the way. No one says a word. Even Gerard stays silent. It’s

clear that he is worried. But they cannot see or find anything strange,

except that the lights in the tunnels are no longer on.

‘Mmm, I could have sworn that the light was still working’, mutters Gerard.

When they get back to the lift, they see that the light has gone out. The

only light shining comes from the lamps they are carrying. Aisha almost

slips and her lantern swings back and forth. Their shadows dance nervously

on the walls of the tunnel.

‘Shall we go back up? I think it’s really creepy down here.’

Gerard presses on the lift button, but nothing happens.

‘Is the lift broken?’ Aisha asks.

‘No, I don’t think so. But there’s no power, replies Gerard.

‘The power comes down from the surface. So something has broken there.

Or it’s been broken on purpose.’


‘Who would do something like that?’ wonders Simon.

‘Vandals from the village. Rogues who are bored and think it’s fun to break

things. When I get my hands on them….’ grumbles Gerard.

‘Do you have a phone with you?’

‘No. Does that mean we’re stuck down here?’ Simon asks sounding scared.

‘Well, if we can’t call anyone we’ll have to come up with a solution

ourselves’, says Gerard.

‘Do you know how electricity is made?’ he asks Aisha. She shakes her

head. Gerard explains that you can use coal not only to heat a stove or the

heating, but that it is also used in a coal-fired power station. The coal from

the mine is burned. They boil water with the heat. Then you get steam.

Just like when you put on the kettle. And that steam turns turbines which

have dynamos in them. Just like a giant version of the dynamo on your

bicycle. And that’s how you can generate electricity. At the coal-fired power

station they heat water by burning coal. But what did we just notice about

the water in this mine?’

‘The water in the mine is already hot!’ exclaims Aisha.

‘Exactly, and I’ve made a machine that generates electricity from hot water.

The machine is here in the mine. So...’

‘So we have power!’ shouts Simon.

‘Power for the lift!’ yells Aisha.

Gerard leads them through two tunnels to the part of the mine where he

has built his machine. It is an iron box that has three pipes sticking out of

it at the bottom. The pipes disappear into the ground. At the top of the box

there is a thin cable. It looks like a power cable. Gerard moves a large lever

so that the power from his machine is connected to the mains of the mine.

The lights go back on. And when they get back to the lift, it also works

again. When they get out of the mine, Gerard immediately sees what the

problem is. Vandals have broken the fuse box of the electricity so that the

power has been cut. Gerard looks around to see whether he can spot any

of the vandals. About 100 metres away someone dressed in black drives

away at high speed on a motorbike ‘Jerk!’ cries Gerard, but the motorbike

rider has already almost disappeared from view.

‘This has gone beyond a prank. Now they’re riding motorbikes.

It’s getting crazier and crazier, growls Gerard.


‘Your power machine saved our lives’, says Simon. ‘Otherwise we would be

trapped in the coal mine now. And now I understand why George was so

interested in this abandoned mine. And I’m interested in it too, because

my car really needs recharging. May we do that with power from your mine

machine?’ he asks Gerard.

‘Yes, why not?’ says Gerard. ‘I think you’re OK’.

Simon recharges his car with power from deep in the coal mine. They have

to continue their search for George. They now know that they’re on the

right track. George has been there, but he cannot tell Gerard where he

went. Luckily they have the postcards.


ASSIGNMENT 1: DRAW A GEOTHERMAL HOUSE (±15 MIN.)

Gerard, the miner, is a smart man. He can generate electricity with

water that has been heated by the earth. He also uses the water to

heat his home. It’s very ecological as well as economical. In England

we heat our homes with a gas-fired central heating boiler. But Gerard

does not need any gas. His water from the mine is already hot.

What you need

30 sheets of paper (preferably larger than A4)

30 pencils or pens

30 colouring pencils and/or pens

Preparation

On the Internet look up what geothermal is exactly and also where it

comes out of the ground.


In the story Gerard has built a machine that can make electricity

using hot water.

The pupils will investigate how with this experiment.

Let the pupils work in groups of 4.

What you need

8 solar towers (that they made themselves in the previous worksheet)

8 tealight candles (new)

8 saucers

1 jug of water

1 lighter or matches

Perhaps unnecessary, but point out to the children that a tealight

candle becomes hot and the wax becomes liquid. Make sure they work

quietly and do not run around.

Preparation

Get the solar towers that were made in the previous worksheet.

Find 8 saucers and a jug of water.

Questions and answers

– What did you see when you held the solar tower above the flame?

The windmill above the solar tower started to turn.

– What flowed when you held the solar tower above the flame?

(Hot) air started to flow.

We heat the water in the bottom of the solar tower. The hot water heats

the air above it. The hot air rises and makes the windmill turn.

– How can you use hot water to generate electricity?

Hot water can be used to heat air. When air heats up, it will flow

(upwards). If you place a windmill in the airflow, the windmill will turn

when the hot air flows past it.

ASSIGNMENT 2: THE GEOTHERMAL SOLAR TOWER (±20 MIN. + 10 MIN. DISCUSSION)

TIP

TIP


If a dynamo is attached to the windmill, the turning movement of the

windmill will also turn the dynamo.

The dynamo will then transform the turning movement into electricity.

– Plastic melts if you hold it above a flame. Why did the plastic of the solar

tower not melt when you held it above the flame of the tealight candle?

The water cools the plastic.

The heat of the flame is absorbed by the water via the plastic of the bottle.

As a result of the heating the plastic can become white, but that is not the

same as melting.

Let the children feel the water through the hole. Then they can feel for

themselves that it has warmed up.

One of the properties of water is that it can absorb a lot of heat.

Our body also uses this property. The water in our body serves to

get rid of heat. For example, when we sweat.

Continue with the Inventors worksheet at another time if you notice

that concentration is flagging.

Continuation of Inventors experiment 2: The journey

Read part 2 of the story to the group.

TIP

TIP


Aisha and Simon have studied George’s next postcard. It is a strange

card with an egg on it.

The postcard could come from anywhere. Luckily the stamp on the

back betrays where the card was posted: somewhere on the coast. So

off to the coast we go.

PART 2:

STORY: THE INVENTORS AND THE WHEEL OF THE SUN (±15 MIN.)

SALT ELECTRICITY


They have already come a long way since they left Gerard.

Simon is tired and Aisha is asleep. Simon doesn’t want to have an accident

and is driving slowly. A car behind them honks its horn. Simon raises his

hand and indicates that the car can pass him.

‘Toot, tooooot.’

‘What a grouch’, grumbles Simon ‘I indicated you could go past.’

The noise wakes Aisha with a start. She looks around, still sleepy. Then she

sees to her alarm that it is not a car but a motorbike behind them and it is

getting closer and closer. Simon sees it too and accelerates.

Just too late. The motorbike passes by them at great speed. The rider is

wearing a black leather suit. His eyes are hidden behind dirty goggles.

And his mouth is covered by a black scarf. Aisha is scared and ducks down

in the car. Exactly at that moment Simon brakes hard and steers the car

abruptly to the right. The motorbike rider reacts too late and keeps going

straight on.

Simon and Aisha drive onto an industrial estate with large, round tanks.

Simon has no idea where he is or how to get out of there. He turns into

a little road behind a small, stone building but soon discovers it is a dead

end. They have nowhere to go and the motorbike rider has probably

followed them. Simon quickly parks Sunny behind coloured barrels which

are covered with a large, blue tarpaulin.

‘Come on, get out fast’, he says to Aisha.

They get out and quickly pull the blue tarpaulin over Sunny so that the car

is hidden. Simon holds his index finger to his lips. ‘Sshh, you stay here, I’ll

go take a look.’

He sneaks off and looks at the empty road ahead of him. No one. He

quickly runs towards the stone building he is hiding behind.

Carefully he looks around the corner.

‘Vroom, vrooom’

The motorbike rider immediately revs up the bike. He has been patiently

waiting a little way away until they appeared.

Simon does not hesitate and runs towards the round tanks as fast as he

can. He has to lure the motorbike rider away from Aisha because she is

trapped. Steel stairs wind up around the large tank.

Simon runs up them.

In any case Aisha is safe, he thinks. From the tank, a steel footbridge

crosses towards a large factory building. He runs across the steel grates

towards the building. When he looks down he sees how the motorbike rider


stops at a large sliding door. Will the motorbike rider see him?

Simon enters the factory through a small door. Down below he can see

bulldozers and lorries driving. The factory is so big that the machines look

like toys. Little toy diggers in a large sandpit. A sandpit full of the whitest,

finest sand you’ve ever seen. Simon bends over the railing and tries to see

where the motorbike rider has got to. Just then he rides in through the big

door.

Simon dives down and tries to hide. Between the crossbeams of the barrier

he can see the motorbike rider driving round in circles. Like a predator

looking for its prey. The rider stops and looks up.

Just then sirens start to sound. The piercing sound is everywhere in the

factory. The orange light from the rotating lamp reflects on the white piles

of sand. The machines stop and the drivers get out. The motorbike rider

flees from the sirens. Simon runs downstairs towards Aisha. As he comes

out of the building he sees how the motorbike rider manages to escape by

driving under a barrier as it comes down.

Simon runs to Aisha as fast as he can. He slips when he runs around the

corner of the stone building. When he scrambles to his feet, he sees a man

in a white coat.

‘You must be Simon’, the man says kindly. Simon breathes in relief when he

sees that Aisha is standing next to the man.

‘Is everything OK?’ Simon asks Aisha.

Aisha nods. ‘I hid well but this gentleman found me. I told him that you

were in danger and so he switched on the alarm.’

‘It’s a good thing he did.’ Simon sighs, ‘That guy almost got me.’

Simon and Aisha are still shaking from all the excitement. The man takes

them to his office in the factory. There is a label on his white coat bearing

only his first name: Chris.

Aisha and Simon get to go to Chris’ office. Chris takes a thermos of hot

chocolate out of a drawer. Aisha drinks the hot chocolate greedily. Chris

takes his lunchbox and hands it to Aisha.

‘You two can eat these. You look like you’re hungry.’

Aisha and Simon enjoy the sandwiches.

‘Who was the guy on the motorbike?’ asks Chris.

‘We don’t know who’s following us’, says Aisha. ‘We’re looking for someone

who may have discovered or invented the ultimate source of energy.’


She gets out the postcards and shows them to Chris. Chris starts to laugh.

‘Well, he has a sense of humour. He sends you a postcard of a boiled egg.’

Aisha and Simon nod.

‘And what do you always put on your egg? Salt! A boiled egg always tastes

best with a pinch of salt. And that’s exactly what we take out of the ground

here: salt.’

‘Aha’, cries Simon. ‘So those big white piles in the factory aren’t piles of

sand but of salt.’

Chris nods. ‘That’s right. Come with me and I’ll show you.’

When Aisha and Simon have finished eating, Chris gives them a tour of the

factory. He explains that there is a layer of salt deep under the ground. The

salt is dissolved in water and then pumped up.

‘But what is George looking for in a salt factory?’ asks Aisha.

I think I know’, says Chris. ‘Isn’t he looking for energy?’

Aisha nods.

‘Did you know you can get energy out of salt water?’ asks Chris.

Chris shows them a large cupboard between the two water tanks.

‘There are special filters in this cupboard. On the left of the cupboard is

salt water. On the right is fresh water. Thanks to the special filters we can

generate energy with fresh-salt water’, Chris explains.

Simon looks at Chris his eyes wide. ‘So is that green energy?’

Simon asks.

‘We call it blue energy, because it comes from sea water. But you could call

it green,” Chris says proudly.

‘May we charge Sunny here?’ asks Aisha.

Chris looks surprised. ‘Who’s Sunny?’

‘Sunny’s a car; an electric one’ explains Simon.

Simon charges Sunny with blue energy. And Chris asks a colleague whether

he remembers a lion tamer.

‘There was someone who came and was interested in our project. Perhaps

it was the lion tamer. But it was a while ago’, says the man.


When Sunny is charged, the electricity is stored in an accumulator.

An accumulator is a type of battery. A rechargeable battery.

Did you know that you can make a battery with a lemon? That’s what

the pupils will investigate in this assignment.


What you need

4 lemons

1 roll of aluminium foil

15 copper coins

1 paring knife and a board

15 headphones from an mp3 player or a computer, etc.

Preparation

Let ±15 kids bring along a pair of headphones from an mp3 player or

computer, etc. from home.

At the supermarket buy 4 lemons. Get a vegetable knife, board and 15

copper coins.

Cut the lemons into quarters. Cut them once lengthwise and once across.

Tear/cut 15 pieces of ±15 x 15 cm from the aluminium foil.

ASSIGNMENT 3: THE ENERGY OF A LEMON (±15 MIN. + 5 MIN. DISCUSSION

TIP



– What do you hear if you hold the plug against the coin and the foil?

If it works you will hear a short tick. If you listen even harder you can even

hear rustling/crackling.

– If you heard something it means that the headphones work.

How is that possible without a battery?

Normally the headphones get energy from a battery. The reason that the

headphones work during this experiment is because you have made a

battery yourself. You might not expect it, but the combination of a lemon

with 2 different metals works like a battery.

If you hold the plug of the headphones against both the coin and the

aluminium foil at the same time, you have connected the positive pole and

negative pole of the lemon battery with each other. In this case the copper

coin is the positive and the aluminium foil is the negative. Then you have

electricity and the headphones work.

– Is the lemon a battery or an accumulator?

The lemon cannot be recharged. Therefore it is a battery and not an

accumulator.

– Energy sources that are not quickly (or ever) depleted and are not

harmful to life on earth are called renewable energy sources.

Name a few examples:

Wind energy, solar energy, hydro-electric power, thermal energy,

bio-energy, blue energy.

– Is the lemon a renewable source of energy?

The lemon is not harmful to life on earth but will deplete quickly.

That is why the lemon is not a renewable source of energy.


Simon and Aisha met a man, called Chris, at the salt factory. He told

them how salt is produced at the factory.

The pupils will investigate how salt is produced exactly in this

experiment.


What you need

15 beakers (plastic or cardboard)

15 teaspoons of salt

1 jug of water

15 saucers

15 teaspoons

15 tealight candles

1 lighter or matches

Preparation

Gather everything you need together. Make sure there is enough room on

your tables to place the saucers with tealight candles securely.


– How did the water taste after stirring it?

The water tasted salty.

– The salt disappeared when you stirred. But it had not gone.

Where did the salt go?

The salt was dissolved in the water. After stirring, the salt is no longer

there as a solid but is really in the water.

– You heated the teaspoon until there was no more water on it. What did

you see on the teaspoon after heating it?

When the water had evaporated, there was a white solid on the teaspoon.

ASSIGNMENT 4: SALT PRODUCTION G (±20 MIN. + 5 MIN. DISCUSSION)

TIP


– After heating you tasted what was left on the teaspoon. How did it taste?

So what was left on the teaspoon after it was heated?

It tasted salty. So after heating, salt was left on the spoon.

This method in which the water evaporates and the substance that is

dissolved in the water remains is called evaporation.

– The water disappeared as a result of heating it. Where did the water go?

The water evaporated. Heating it made the water hot. This made the liquid

water turn into a gas. So the water has not really disappeared, it has

simply gone into the air as steam (as a gas).

– We dissolved salt in water and then let the water evaporate. There are

thick layers of salt under the ground. Can you explain how the salt is taken

out of the ground at a salt factory?

The salt in the ground is dissolved in water. The salty water is them

pumped up to the surface. In the salt factory, the water of the brine

pumped up is evaporated. And then you are left with the salt (as a solid).

BACKGROUND INFORMATION: GETTING SALT OUT OF THE GROUND

You can get salt out of sea water or from layers of salt under the ground.

To get salt out of the ground, pipes are placed in the ground that go through

various layers in the ground and eventually end up in the layer of salt.

Warm water is then pumped through these pipes

(that are often kilometres long).

The salt present in the ground dissolves in the warm water. The brine

created in this way is then pumped back up to the surface in pipes and

transported to the factory. In the factory the water is evaporated in boiling

kettles. The salt remains. Then the salt is dried in a spin-dryer.

Tidy away all your things!

On the inventors website www.deuitvinders.com there is an animation film

that explains how you can generate electricity with blue energy.

LifelongLearningProgramme

COLOFON

ColophonIssue 2014 Foundation Inventors | www.theinventors.eu

Concept and realizationAtelier Vrijdag

This publication may not be copied or reproduced without written permission from The Inventors

This project has been funded with support from the European Commission.

This publication reflects the views only of the author, and the Commission cannot be held

responsible for any use which may be made of the information contained therein.

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