Junk Drawer Physics

There's not need for expensive, high-tech lab equipment to perform physics experiments-you probably have all you need in your home junk drawer. Turn a plastic cup into a pinhole camera using waxed paper, a rubber band, and a thumbtack. Build a swinging wave machine using a series of washers suspended on strings from a yardstick. Use a cork, string, and water-filled plastic bottle to create a simple accelerometer. Or construct your own planetarium from an empty potato chip canister, construction paper, scissors, and a pin. Physics teacher Bobby Mercer provides readers with more than 50 great hands-on experiments that can be performed for just pennies . . . or less. Each project has a materials list, detailed step-by-step instructions with illustrations, and a brief explanation of the scientific principle being demonstrated. Junk Drawer Physics also includes sidebars of fascinating physics facts: did you know the Eiffel Tower is six inches taller in summer than in winter because its steel structure expands in the heat? Educators and parents will find this title a handy resource to teach children about physics topics that include magnetism, electricity, force, motion, light, energy, sound, and more, and have fun at the same time. Bobby Mercer has been a high school physics teacher for over two decades. He is the author of The Flying Machine Book, The Racecar Book, and Smash It! Crash It! Launch It! and lives with his family outside of Asheville, North Carolina.