Physics: Age 11

18 illustrated Physics lessons for Age 11.

The path of a tossed ball When something moves, it passes through many places one after another. All these places together make its traj…
A ball rolling in a straight line The path of a moving object is called its trajectory, and here the ball's positions form a straight line. The …
Conductors and Insulators A simple circuit has a cell, wires, and a bulb. If the material in the gap lets electricity pass, the bulb lig…
Water changes state Water can be solid ice, liquid water, or gas in the air. Heating or cooling makes it melt, freeze, evaporate, …
Rocks gather into a ball Small rocks and dust drift around a center in space. They move closer and closer until they press together int…
Magnet moving inside a coil When a magnet moves inside a coil of wire, it pushes the tiny electrons in the metal along. That flow of elect…
Vibrating Air When an object vibrates, it pushes and pulls the air around it. The number of vibrations each second, measured…
Inside a Soap Bubble A soap bubble is a pocket of air wrapped in a very thin film. The film is mostly water, held together by soap …
Water Pushes Up When an object is under water, the water pushes it upward. The size of that push is the same as the weight of …
A lamp beam on a curved panel A lamp shines onto a curved surface. Where the light lands straight on, all its energy is packed into a tiny s…
Air Presses Down Air is real stuff, so a tall stack of it weighs something and pushes down on everything below. When that push …
Balls Flying from a Cliff A hand throws balls sideways from a high cliff. Slow balls land soon, but faster balls travel farther and can …
Light through a microscope A small lamp shines light upward through a glass slide and two lenses. Each lens bends the light a little more…
High Tide on Both Sides Earth and the Moon both orbit a point that sits between them. The Moon's pull stretches Earth's oceans, so the…
Glowing Space Rock A space rock rushes into the air around Earth. The air pushes against it, gets very hot, and makes the rock gl…
Sunlight Through Cloud Droplets A cloud is made of countless tiny water droplets. Sunlight hits them and bounces off in every direction, so th…
Water droplet rainbow Sunlight passes into a round water droplet, bends, and bounces off the inside back. It leaves as a fan of colo…
Long Throats, Loud Roars A lion's throat has stretchy cartilage that opens into a long, wide space. Air pushed through that big space m…