One of the activities my children ask to do over and over again is our jumping frogs which are a great way to learn about static electricity, so inspired by Inspiration Laboratories moving ghost we made jumping ghosts instead of frogs. To make it more of an investigation rather than demonstration we tried to make tissue paper and normal paper jump.
Equipment
Black Balloon
Paper, cut into ghost shapes. We used tissue paper and normal paper.
Woolly jumper or hair
Method
Cut up your different types of paper into ghost shapes ( or anything else you want to make jump )
Blow up your balloon, and rub it on a jumper or your hair. Hold the balloon above one type of paper ghosts and watch them jump up.
Repeat with the other paper ghosts, do both types jump?
Can you design a simple table to show your results?
Extension Activity
Can you try any other types of paper?
Can you time how long the ghosts stay stuck for?
If you rub the balloon on your hair for longer do the ghosts stick for longer?
Do smaller ghosts stick for longer than bigger ones? How many can you stick at once?
Other Static Electricity ideas
More great Halloween science ideas
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[…] Double-up science lessons with Halloween and teach children about static electricity by using paper ghosts and balloons. Get the children to rub balloons on a woolly jumper and then hover them over the paper ghosts and […]