Audience
Educators
Grade Levels
Informal Education
Subject
Planet Earth
Type
Lesson Plans / Activities
The big idea of this demonstration is that the Sun and Earth have different magnetic properties. Sunspots are related to magnetism on the Sun. Earth has a strong simple magnetic field with two poles. The educator builds the magnetic fields using polystyrene spheres, strong magnets and staples. Then the participants make “field detectors” from simple objects to predict the locations of the fields.
Solar System Magnetism Activity [870KB PDF file]