Members of the school district’s Maintenance Team visited English Bluff Elementary School recently to teach students about energy. More than 40 students in Grades 3, 4 and 5 were treated to a presentation by Pierre Ngo, Electrical Manager and given a tour of the school’s Mechanical Room by Dean While, Mechanical Manager.
The presentation covered a range of topics including:
- What is energy?
- Where does it come from?
- How is electricity transported from power stations to houses and schools?
- What are switches for?
- What is the difference between conductors and insulators?
- The dangers of electricity
- Information on geothermal heating and how the ground below the English Bluff Elementary contains energy which is used to heat the school
- How solar panels work
- Ohm’s Law, Power Formulas, Kinetic Energy and Potential Energy
- Demonstration of a home-built DC motor with paper clips and magnet wire
Following the presentation and tour, students moved to the gym where they worked in small groups to build a solar power motor. In addition to Pierre and Dean, two of the district’s electricians, Ivan and Taran, helped guide students as they built the solar powered DC motor scale models to better understand the concepts of electricity and solar power.
At the end of the session, Pierre and Dean presented each of the students with a Certificate of Completion.
“We were thrilled to be invited to talk to the students by teacher Ivana Jorgensen,” said Pierre. “As they were learning about energy, she thought it would be a great idea to bring us in to explain how electrical, geothermal and gas energy is utilized at the school. It was so rewarding to be able to share our knowledge and talk about what we do on a daily basis to the students. I was also amazed at how much knowledge the students already had on the topic – it was very impressive.”
