Science - Energy Resources

Here is a good site to look at.  It also has  quiz and other resorces pages.


The earths energy comes from the sun!!!

The energy in coal originally came from the Sun.

Prehistoric plants stored the Sun's energy in their leaves, and when they died and eventually formed coal seams, that energy was still there.

When we burn coal (or any fossil fuel), we're releasing chemical energy that was stored in plants millions of years ago. 

The same goes for Wind and Wave power. Waves occur because of winds, and winds blow because the Sun warms our atmosphere. Warm air tends to rise, and winds are due to other air moving in to replace it.

Most power stations burn coal, oil or natural gas to run the generators. Others use uranium, or the flow of water.

Electricity is sent around the country using high-voltage power lines. Nearly all of the power we use comes from large power stations, although some places such as isolated farms, or hospitals, have their own diesel generators.

Source:  http://www.darvill.clara.net/altenerg/

Science - KS3 Bitesize

Today I spent some time doing revision on Bitesize.

Energy, electricity and forces:

• Energy transfer and storage
• Electric current and voltage
• Magnets and electric current
• Physics triathlon

Then I did the section on:  The environment, the Earth and the universe

• Rocks
• The environment, the Earth and the universe
• Changes in the environment

Our Solar System - my presentation

The Solar System

Link to Earth and space blog

This is an interesting blog on earth and space - have a look at it !  http://teachingblueeyedblondes.blogspot.com/

January 3 - closest point to the sun, can you believe it?

 

Read all about it on:  http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/23degrees/2011/01/our_journey_begins_here_closes.html

Extract: 

Believe it or not, it's a very special day. Despite the freezing weather we are getting at the moment, the Earth is at its closest point to the sun it will get all year. It's called Perihelion which is Greek for "near to the sun", and right now the Earth is 5 million kilometres closer to the sun than it will be in July, when it's at its furthest point.



Perihelion highlights how fascinating the relationship is between the earth and its cosmic star. Who would have thought that at the point when we are closest to the sun, we would experience such freezing temperatures?

Perihelion is a result of the slightly strange shape of the Earth's orbit around the sun. It's not a perfect circle, it's an ellipse, and the sun isn't even in the centre, it's slightly off to one side. So at the moment we are just 147.1 million kilometres [91.4 million miles] from the sun.




You are probably thinking - if we are closer, then why aren't we warmer? Well, our journey around the sun is complex and there's another factor that shapes our climate that is more powerful than just how close we are to the sun. And that's the tilt of the planet. Earth doesn't sit upright; it's tilted over to one side at an angle of 23.5 degrees.


The tilt and the Earth's motion around the sun create the seasons.


In January the northern hemisphere is tilted away from the sun so the sunlight is spread more thinly over the northern half of the planet so we get our winter. Meanwhile the southern hemisphere which is now tilted towards the sun gets more sunlight and therefore enjoys summer. Gradually the Earth moves around the sun until July when the Northern hemisphere tilts towards the sun, when the reverse is true.

Now – in January – we are in midwinter, but the northern hemisphere is already starting its journey back towards the sun and over the next few months we will get more and more sunlight and slowly the Northern Hemisphere will rise from its slumber and move towards spring.




References: 
http://scienceblogs.com/
http://www.crh.noaa.gov/fsd/?n=season
http://plus.maths.org/content/comment/reply/2610
http://joseph-bartlo.net/articles/111897.htm
http://addins.kwwl.com/blogs/weather/archives/12492
http://redoubtreporter.wordpress.com/2010/03/24/reasons-for-the-seasons-%E2%80%94-distance-doesn%E2%80%99t-cause-changes-in-warmth-sunlight/
http://www.warren-wilson.edu/~physics/PhysPhotOfWeek/2008PPOW/20081219EarliestSunset/index.html
http://www.nightsky.ie/2010/01/
http://astrobob.areavoices.com/2010/09/20/jupiter-closest-to-earth-since-1963/
http://www.thesuntoday.org/sun-101/our-star-an-introduction-to-the-sun/