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====== Zinc-Copper Battery with Nail and Salt-water ======

===== What is this lesson? =====

This lesson is very similar in subject matter and scope to the salt-water battery lesson. While it doesn't offer anything different to the curriculum, it can be used as a substitute battery lesson where aluminum cans are hard to find.

If this lesson interests you, there's lots to do:
  * Write the [[teachers guide|teacher's guide]]
  * Adapt the default [[evaluation form]]
  * Design and upload [[illustrations]]
If you're interested in doing any of that, great! Leave a note on the [[:lesson index#Zinc-Copper Battery with Nail and Salt-water|lesson index]] that you're taking charge.

Whether or not you're interested in writing a part of this lesson, please leave lots of comments on this page, the teacher's guide, and the evaluation form. Thanks!

===== What this lesson teaches =====

==== Science/Engineering principles ====
- how batteries work

- series and parallel wiring
==== Technical skills ====
none
==== Design skills ====
maybe students think of other salts or metals they could use in their batteries
==== Other skills ====
teamwork to light an LED
==== Deliverables ====
Students make their own nail batteries, and combine them with classmates to light LEDs.

===== How this lesson fits into the curriculum =====
PEN lessons that meet the requirement are noted in brackets.
==== Curricular knowledge and skills ====
basic circuits
==== Extracurricular skills ====
none
==== Follow-up lessons ====
Anything involving electricity

===== Practical Work =====
==== Demonstrations ====
[Copied from salt-water battery lesson] 



Magnet demonstration: to demonstrate positive and negative charges. Teacher should have multiple magnets and a fairly smooth surface, so that they can demonstrate how the magnets can either repel each other (demonstrating similar charge) or attract each other (demonstrating opposite charge)


==== Experiments ====
none
==== Design/Build Work ====
Students make their own nail batteries by wrapping galvanized nails with towel scraps soaked in salt water, then covering these towels with copper foil. Students will join into groups of 3-5 to connect their batteries in series and light an LED.


===== Logistics/Resources =====
==== Building materials ====
- galvanized nails (zinc)

- copper foil (copper)

- towel scraps

- bowl of water saturated with salt for soaking towels

- alligator clips

- small LEDs
==== Demonstration materials ====
small magnets for demonstration of charges, whiteboard and markers for drawing diagrams
==== Other materials/equipment ====
- something to cut copper foil and towels
==== Classroom logistics ====
Two groups of 4-5 students, each with their own nail battery, works well because the teacher can answer questions more easily. The class can be scaled up, provided you keep a roughly 1:10 ratio for teacher:student.

===== Optional Questions =====
**Why should students want to participate in this lesson?**

To create electricity using household objects.

**Why should teachers want to teach it?**

[from salt-water battery]



Get to teach science that is not usually taught, but about things that will be instantly recognizable to students.



Competition element (“battery races”) is a lot of fun.



Figuring out an anode-cathode metaphor on the fly is good teaching experience! (I've taught this a few times a different metaphor worked each time) 

**If this lesson (and its prerequisites) were the only PEN lessons someone took, what should they be able to do?**

[also from salt-water battery]



Describe how a battery actually produces electricity.



Make a battery themselves out of an anode, a cathode and an electrolyte.



Describe a circuit as being continuous and made of moving charges.



Also: understand how batteries are attached in series.

**If you had to teach this lesson tomorrow morning, what would you spend tonight working on? (assuming that materials were not an issue)**

Anode-cathode and parallel-series metaphors!



Also: maybe providing other metals and salt solutions for students to experiment with.

**If you hadn’t taught this lesson before, what questions would you have for someone who had taught a very similar lesson?**

What are your favorite metaphors? Is there any way to work in a design element? Which of the two battery lessons would you recommend, and why?

**If the only materials available were broken radios, TVs, and computers, could you do all the electronics in this lesson? (assuming you had solder, soldering irons, etc.) If not, what would be missing?**

Yes.

**If the only structural materials available were dish-cloths, cardboard, and plastic bags, could you make the mechanical bits of this lesson? (assume equipment as above) If not, what would be missing?**

Yes.