Lesson plan

Introduction (5 minutes)

• Meet the students at the door to the classroom, have each student enter the room one at a time making sure that each individual opens and closes the door one by one.
  
  
• Wait until they have sat down to explain to them what you were doing. Inform them that each one of them have just lost energy through opening and closing the door because there was no way to harness the potential available.
  
  
• Next move to open and close the window, then just walk around the entire room (energy loss from the floor) they will soon see what you are aiming at.

Water demonstration (5 minutes)

• Have a measuring container in the sink (3L), gather the students around this space and then turn on the tap while using a stopwatch to time the water filling the container.
  
  
• Once filled discuss with the students how long it took to fill and what that means in relation to flow (flow rate). Explain that they should see the tap NOT as a tap but as a switch, which uses energy every time it is opened and that energy is wasted by going down the drain once it has been discarded.

Energy Recovery (10 minutes)

• Discuss with your students how might you recover some of the spent energy instead of losing out on it by washing it down the drain.
  
  
• Allow the students to explore ideas and prompt them when necessary.
  
  
• Have a look in under the sink at the drainpipe; hint at using nano/micro-technology inside or attached to the pipe to recover some of the energy.
  
  
• See if some of the students can come up with an idea, for example: a nano/micro-hydro turbine/waterwheel.
  
  
• Talk about some of the issues with this at the moment, like energy storage in the home or business using batteries.

Below are some excellent links for use with your students, which has a step-by-step approach, including downloads to building a Micro-Hydro Turbine, Micro-Wind Turbine and Biogas Generator in class!

From the Canadian re-energy website:

Click here to see the manual on producing a small Small-Scale Hydroelectric Generator.
Click here to see the manual on producing your own biomass generator 
Click here to see the manual on producing your own wind turbine
 …and …

Click here to read about water-pipe micro turbines on the EDIE (Environmental Data Interactive Exchange) website.

Visual Stimulation (10 minutes)

Returning to their seats, show the students using the data projector, a series of swift clips and links to inspire their thinking further, now that you have them on a roll!

The sustainable dance club - dance floor making electricity.
Click here to see a YouTube video on the sustainable dance club.

Interactive Architecture.org "covers emerging architectural and artistic practices where digital technologies & virtual spaces merge with tangible and physical spatial experiences".
Click here to read their explanation of the energy generating dance floor.

The hamster driven nanogenerator - an experiment on piezo-electronics.
Click here to see a YouTube video with a hamster with small-scale implants generating electricity by moving

The Human finger driven nanogenerator - another experiment on piezo-electronics.
Click here to see a YouTube video with a hand with small-scale implants generating electricity by moving the finger 

 

Click here to see Faraday induction explained in a video from the Vega science trust 
Click here to see three types of windmills explained in a video from the Vega science trust

 

 

Independent Research (20 minutes)

• Have the Micro-Wind Turbine already set up and connected to the multi-meter, spin the turbine and show the students the reading on the multi-meter. Explain the creating energy is that simple, a generator and motion and that’s it!
  
  
• Set the students the task for their project, which is to research (in groups of two or three) multiple opportunities (at least seven) in the home or at school where it may be possible to recover energy through the use of nano/micro-technology. The technology for their ideas may not even exist yet but that is exactly what you are look for - entrepreneurial ideas!
  
  
• Explain to the students that their research from this will be required to be presented in electronic form, through the use of blogs, audio visual movie, slideshow or a PowerPoint presentation. The students may use Laptops/desktops for their research.

The use of the links attached to this lesson plan may be used at your own discretion, depending on the level of ability of your students. For those of lower ability you may want to offer some guidance on where to retrieve information, while for those whom excel you may want to offer extension activities, which are suggested below.

 

Questionnaire (5 minutes)

• Clarify the purpose of using the questionnaire (all results can be used for spreadsheets and data tables) and show an example of a complete one so that they see how to fill it out.

 

 

Homework & end (5 minutes)

• Recap on the lesson and its contents; pick a few students to describe briefly what ideas they have come up with so far for research.
  
  
• Set Homework: Students are to work on their research for a solution to renewable energy creation.
  This can be done via skype or through a social networking site with their fellow group members. Remember it is not a competition and ensure creative discussion is encouraged to help with innovative problem solving!
  
  
• Thank students and dismiss.

 

Extension Activities for the Students

Students who are of a high ability should be encouraged to connect with students in other countries to work on a combined cross-border project, perhaps using eTwinning or find partners through Comenius if you come from the European Union.

This could for instance be carried out through skype conferencing og thorugh weblogging activities.

 

 

Follow-up lesson

• The next lesson could incorporate more in depth research with the aim of moving towards building a plan for experimenting with ‘new’ nano/micro-technologies and materials.
  
  
• This may have to be done using micro-technology as the grounding and then advancing with more specialised material and equipment depending on your resources and facilities.

 

Suggestions

• It would be useful for the teacher to start working on a solution along with the students, in order to move away from this approach to education where the teacher is seen as the giver of knowledge.
  
  
• Working alongside the students while creating a solution would promote greater enthusiasm from the class.
  
  
• Perhaps you could start building a Micro-Hydro Turbine following the instructions from this website. This could be tested on the rainwater guttering pipes from the school roof, using a similar principal as rainwater harvesting. This would show the students how the product could be applied to real life situations.
  Click here to see the manual on building a small-scale water turbine.