Classroom Outreach

Want to get your students excited about science – for free? Have a MagLab expert visit your classroom! Our extensive classroom outreach programs reach more than 10,000 students each year. Teachers can choose from one of a dozen outreach topics that will give students a hands-on experience with science. If you’re interested in an outreach activity conducted here at the lab in conjunction with a tour, please see our On-Site Outreach and Tours page.

Science nights for individual schools are not offered by the MagLab. School-wide science events or requests for MagLab outreach at community events must be requested 8 weeks in advance and take place during school hours or be pre-approved by Carlos Villa. Please sign up for the Maglab Educator’s Club to keep informed of Maglab events open to the public.

• We offer a series of specially designed, hands-on lessons
• Each session features inquiry-based activities
• Visits are tailored to your specific needs
• Usually last 45 minutes to an hour
• We provide downloadable pre/post materials in PDF format
• All activities are correlated to Florida’s Sunshine State Standards
• Outreach is available on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday only.
• Must be scheduled 15–90 days before the requested date.

Choose from one of the lessons below, or call us to customize a program to meet your specific needs. Please be prepared to stay with your class at all times during the outreach. Our educators are not responsible for the class, and therefore the regular room teacher must be present. In cases of a substitute, call ahead to the Center so that proper arrangements can be made.

Build an Electromagnet: Turn Magnets On & Off

Combining items commonly found in and around your house, you can create an electromagnet. Students are given the items and the basic directions for creating an electromagnet that is strong enough to pick up paper clips. They are then encouraged to modify their magnets and note the effects that each change brings to the strength of the magnet.
Download Pre/Post Materials (PDF).

Electricity, Static & Currents: The Power All Around Us

The motion of charged particles creates magnetic fields, but the actual motion of those particles is just as important as the fields they create. This activity aims to show what electricity is and how it travels. Students will create series circuits and parallel circuits using light bulbs as test units, then will see a Van de Graaff generator create electric sparks that can be used to transfer charges.
Download Pre/Post Materials (PDF).

Ion Motors: Turn, Turn, Turn

We apply an electric charge to create a current in both a wire and an ionized solution. This shows principles of electricity, magnetism and chemistry as the students observe motion and changes right before their eyes.

Lenz’s Law: Taming the Eddy currents

Science often presents some interesting principles, and this outreach is the investigation of one of them. It builds on the principles covered in Build an Electromagnet, challenging students to create a small electric motor.
Download Pre/Post Materials (PDF).

Magnet Exploration: An Attractive Exploration

After a short introduction detailing the composition and principles of magnets, students are encouraged to experiment with magnets of different compositions, shapes and sizes. Students are encouraged to make "amazing discoveries" about the magnets, and to physically show the principles discussed earlier by actually using the magnets.
Download Magnets

Molecule Madness: Compounds of our Creation

This is an opportunity to explore the smallest world around us by allowing the students to discover atoms. Using special magnetic models as stand-ins for the real things, students will weigh their "newly discovered atoms" using a triple beam balance. They then assign symbols and names to "their" atoms and combine them to create molecules.
Download Pre/Post Materials (PDF).

Nature of Science: Tools of the Scientist

Science is not the memorizations of facts. Science is a way of thinking, and scientific knowledge is subject to change as new information is learned. New observations can challenge or support or notions of how the world around us works. Sometimes a new theory leads to looking at old observations in a new way. These are all aspects of the nature of science.
Download Pre/Post Materials (PDF).

Rainbows and Light: Our Favorite Spectrum

This is a chance to study the basic principles of the visible spectrum. Students will discuss white light, refraction and the spectrum of light. They will use prisms to break up white light and see the spectrum it creates.
Download Pre/Post Materials (PDF).

Spectrum Analysis: The Fingerprints of Gases

During our visit we will discuss the colors of light, then the students will use spectrum (diffraction grating) glasses to observe the different spectra. Using a spectral analysis chart, they will be asked to identify which gases are in which tubes.
Download Pre/Post Materials (PDF).

Superconductivity: A Matter of Temperature

Students drive a discussion on principles and properties of magnets, then construct their own electromagnets and test them. After discussing the variables that affect the strength of their magnets, they will see how temperature is the ultimate variable when dealing with electromagnets. The lesson concludes with an explanation and demonstration of the Meissner Effect.

What Is a Scientist: Explore the World Around You

This outreach introduces students to the subject of science, explains how scientists and engineers work day in and day out, and gets them thinking about the way they view science. Then students use their observational skills to explore magnets of different shapes and sizes, and make some amazing discoveries.

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Attention any non-NHMFL employee interested in volunteering: all CIRL outreach must be conducted by a CIRL staff member or by an NHMFL employee who has been supervised by Carlos Villa and completed all lab safety training. If you have any questions, please contact Carlos Villa at villa@magnet.fsu.edu

To request an outreach, please complete our online Outreach Request Form. For more information contact Felicia Hancock at hancock@magnet.fsu.edu or (850) 645-0034.