| Learning Objectives/Lesson Goals | - Auroras are caused by energy sent from the sun that gets trapped in the Earth’s magnetic field bounces around in the atmosphere and creates light.
- The Earth is like a giant bar magnet with magnetic north and south poles. The Earth’s magnetic field can be demonstrated and experienced by using a bar magnet. The Auroras occur in the Earth’s magnetic fields.
- People living in the Polar Regions have seen the auroras and tell stories and legends about how the lights came to be. Scientists are still studying and learning more about the auroras.
- People tell stories and legends to explain nature.
- Students will listen to a fictional story about the Auroras.
- They will experiment with a magnet and iron filings to observe a magnetic field.
- Students will make their artistic expression of an aurora display.
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| WHERE | Classroom |
| WHO | Classroom Volunteers |
| MATERIALS |
- Aurora story and perhaps other non-fiction books about the Aurora Borealis/Australis
- Pictures of Auroras
- Black Construction Paper
- Chalk Pastels
- Bar magnets
- Iron filings in a closed container
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| ACTIVITIES |
- Explain that energy the sun sends by solar wounds travels through space and enters the Earth’s magnetic field. This energy reacts with the Earth’s atmosphere to create light of varying colors.
- Read the story Aurora. Help students understand that this story is one person’s understanding of how the auroras come to be in the skies.
- Students will create an aurora picture to simulate the shapes and colors of the auroras. Demonstrate the process.
The template is placed on a piece of black construction paper. Using pastels lightly color back and forth in parallel strokes along the curved line.
- The template is then moved down slightly using another color; the process of short strokes is blended into the color above and over the template.
- Other aurora shapes can be created by using a swirled line and then softening it by blending the chalk or brushing it.
- Tell the students that different gasses in the atmosphere create the colors that make the auroras. Changes in the magnetic field create changes in the shapes of the auroras.
- The chalk pictures can be sprayed with hair spray to seal the chalk.
- As students finish their aurora pictures, they can experiment with a magnet beneath a sealed case filled with iron filings. Students watch the iron filings, acting like small magnets to orient themselves to the magnet beneath. The filings create a pattern that represents the Earth’s magnetic field.
- Ask students if they can feel the magnetic force?
- Tell students the filings are showing you where the magnetic field is. Each little iron filing is acting like a magnet and lining up north and south.
- If time, read one of the non-fiction books about auroras.
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