Magnetism

This will be a worthwhile post.   I'll not only tell you how to do cool experiments with your kiddos, but how to get your very own iron filings for free.

Hear that?  FREE Iron Filings!

When you have iron filings you can do cool experiments like this with the kiddos:

Pretty Magnetic Field Lines

I cut the corners of a piece of paper and folded them up to make a tray.  That way the iron filings wouldn't go everywhere.

I wish I could have let the kids try this on their own, but I don't trust them enough––I can see iron filings going everywhere and kids accidentally breathing in too much iron and then dying.  Not the best situation you want to be in as a teacher.

So instead we did a demonstration where they all stood around one table and watched.  It was cool and I the kids really liked it.  They also all asked me if they could do it themselves.  Since I don't want anyone dying, I said no.

Now for the part you've all been waiting for: How to get your very own iron-filings for free.


Method #1: 
Grab an old iron or steel nail and file it down with a heavy-duty file (not the wimpy kind you file your nails with, but a "manly file," as my husband called it.)  File down the nail.

I actually did this method for an hour during my Saturday afternoon.  I didn't get very much iron.  There was a small lump, and I could do some things with it, but you really don't get very much.



Method #2:
Place a magnet in a plastic bag.  Go outside. Rub the plastic bag in the dirt.  Lift and shake. There should be iron on the outside of the bag, attracted to the magnet.  Put this in a cup and take the magnet out of the bag to release the iron into the cup.  Tadaa!!  Repeat, repeat, repeat, repeat.

Depending on how much you want, this can also take a while.  The ASL interpreter in my first class told me about this, so during lunch I went out for ~5 minutes and just played in the dirt collecting iron.  It was awesome.  I got enough for our little demonstration above for my next class.

My little collection of iron filings from 5 minutes of Method #2.

I did also collect some dirt with this method.  So I took my dirty iron mixture and purified it even more by moving it from the cup to the final container using the same magnet-in-a-bag technique.  That lessened the amount of dirt quite a bit.  I used this second separation in my demonstration.

Method 2 would be a fun activity to do with your kids, too.  Make them go out and collect

real, natural iron from the EARTH!!!

and then use it to learn more about magnets.  (This could also go with any mixture separation lesson plans you may be doing.)

Yay for magnets.