Sun Research
Today, we will be asking questions about the Sun.
Step 1: Open up your Google Doc about the Sun. SHARE this document with me and your teammates.
Step 2: Answer the following questions to the best of your knowledge. This will require you to SEARCH on Google. When you get the answer, write it down in ONE to TWO sentences, and then paste the URL in. IF you use a textbook, write down the page that you found the answer.
- How does the Sun make its heat?
- How does the heat travel to Earth?
- How far is it between the Sun and the Earth?
- Do we depend on the Sun? Why?
- What is passive solar energy?
- How does a solar cell work?
LAB
Pick a shiny, a dark, and a light object and place on a whiteboard. Go outside and gather 10 minutes of data for each in full sunlight. Then, move the objects quickly to full shade and gather 10 minutes of data. Your temperature data in degrees C will be gathered with a digital thermometer.
Graph the data for all three objects on a graph paper sheet. Place your independent variable on the x-axis and your depedent variable on the y-axis.
Answer the following questions:
- Which trial had the biggest change in temperature in the sunlight? How do you know?
- Which cooled the fastest in the shade? Again, show evidence
- Which item came closest to its orgiginal temperature by the end of the 20 min?
- If you want an object to get hot, what color should it be? Does your data support this?
- If you have a choice of roofing material (light, dark, or shiny) what keeps the summer heat out? Why?
- What is insulation, in your words or in a picture?
- What is radiant heat cooling in your own words or pictures?
- What is heat capacity (Google it) and how it is related to this activity?
=============things to share
Home Insulation
Insulation in Iowa (take a look at this website)
Table of Common R-values
To calculate R-values, we make a sandwich of insulation material. Just because something is thicker doesn't necessarily mean it is better. Sometimes, though, higher R-value material is more expensive. It's a trade-off, just like many things in life.
Make the following sandwiches for your table on a piece of paper, big enough for the entire class to see.:
A sandwich with a R-value of 15 or better
A sandwich with a R-value of 50 or better
A sandwich with a maximum thickness of 6 inches
A sandwich with a maximum thickness of 12 inches
Also, when it comes to windows, we have a problem...It is going to be a very thin sandwich, unless we put up drapes (curtains) or some sort of a quilted batting at night. Even so, that part of the wall will be colder. The other trade-off is that windows that have bigger R-values have a bigger cost.
Based on this, what type of windows do you think your house should have?
Personal Evaluation (to be filled out in teams of two)
http://www.dummies.com/how-to/content/what-are-passive-and-active-solar-energy-systems.html
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