Is your child interested in learning about energy? Or maybe they have an energy project to complete? To celebrate Earth Day on April 22nd, we have teamed up with SSE Airtricity, Ireland’s largest provider of 100% Green Energy, to bring you some fun energy learning activities and resources for kids to inspire them for the future.

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With the help of SSE Airtricity we have put together some fun energy learning activities and resources for your child to understand more about energy. In this article you’ll find:

1. Energy Facts For Kids + an Energy Quiz with free downloadable sheets
2. Two fun activities you can do at home to learn about energy with downloadable instructions
3. Energy Word Unscramble sheet (with answers)
4. Printable Energy Crosswords for younger and older kids (with solutions)
5. Energy Word Searches for younger and older kids
6. Topic ideas for research for energy projects for older kids

Energy Learning Activities And Resources

#1. 20 Fun Energy Facts For Kids To Learn

Check out these fun energy facts and then try our to see if you got them all!

1. Energy is what powers or makes things work, including humans.
2. Energy can be described as Potential energy (stored in an object/person at rest) or Kinetic energy (in motion energy). A good way to think of this is when you hold your basketball, it has potential energy, but when you shoot it towards the hoop it has kinetic energy.
3. Energy comes in many different forms including heat (thermal), light, electrical, chemical, movement (kinetic), nuclear, gravitational, and sound.
4. Energy transforms into different types of energies, depending on how it it is used.
5. Electrical energy is the most widely used form of energy in the world.
6. For electric energy to be used, it must pass through a conductor, such as metal wire.
7. English scientist William Gilbert is credited with discovering electricity in the 1600’s.
8. The word energy comes from the Greek word for activity, energeia
9. For many years our electrical energy was produced by burning fossil fuels such as coal, gas, oil, turf etc. These resources occur naturally over millions of years but will eventually run out.
10. Fossil fuels must be burned to produce energy and this can emit harmful gases (known as greenhouse gases) into the environment.
11. Fossil fuels are the result of the decomposition of plants and animals. They must be burned to produce energy.
12. Newer methods of energy production are known as green energy or renewable energy and they are much kinder to the environment.
13. Green energy solutions harness the power of our natural resources, such as wind, sun (solar), water (rivers and oceans), earth/soil (geothermal) to produce the electrical energy needed to power homes, cars and businesses.
14. Geothermal energy comes from heat stored deep within the earth’s crust.
15. Thermal energy is measured in joules and is the energy that comes from heat.
16. Plants use energy from the sun (heat) to make their own food and release oxygen. This process is known as photosynthesis.
17. Food contains energy and this is measured in calories or joules.
18. When we digest our food, chemical energy is released and stored as potential energy. This is transformed to kinetic energy when we move, grow, etc.
19. Sound energy is produced from the vibrations of one object applying force to another object. Sound energy is measured in decibels and pascals.
20. Chemical energy is released during the transformation of one substance to a new substance.

You can download these fun facts here (PDF Format).

Fun Energy Quiz

Have you been paying attention? Take our fun energy quiz based on information in the facts above and see how many facts you can remember (don’t peek!).

Download our energy quiz here and print it out. Now have a go and see how many answers you can get right.

What’s your score? Did you get 100%?

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#2. Two Fun Energy Learning Activities For Kids To Try At Home

1. How Energy is Transferred

Using some marbles and a ruler you can see the transfer of energy in action!

You Will Need:

• A ruler with a groove down the middle of it
• Some marbles

Download the Kinetic Energy Activity Sheet and have a go yourself to find out how it works!

2. Make Your Own Windmill

To discover more about how windmills work, how about making your very own windmill? It is quick and easy to do and will show you wind energy in action!

We have two different Make Your Own Windmill projects, one needs card, scissors and a pencil with an eraser on top. The other is made using paper and origami!

Here are download links for the printable PDFs: Make Your Own Windmill With Card and Make Your Own Origami Windmill.

Imagine now the large windmills you see in wind farms. They move in the same way as your homemade windmill and the power produced by the rotating paddles can be turned into electricity and used to power our homes, schools and businesses.

#3. Energy Word Unscramble Exercise

Can you unscramble all the ygrene related words on our Word Unscramble Exercise?

Download the Energy Word Unscramble (PDF) and have fun unscrambling the letters to make real energy words!

#4. Energy Crosswords For Kids

Practice your spelling and have fun at the same time filling out our energy crosswords.

We have two crossword sheets, one for 1st-3rd class and one for 4th-6th class.

Did you work out all the answers to the clues? Did you complete the crossword?

Here are download links for the printable PDFs: Energy Crossword Younger Kids and Energy Crossword Older Kids.

#5. Energy Word Searches

Now try our turbo-powered word searches. Can you find all the energy associated words in the grids?

Each word search sheet has energy related words and phrases to find.

There is one for 1st-3rd class and one for 4th-6th class.

What was your score? Did you find all the words?

Here are download links for the printable PDFs: Energy Word Search Younger Kids and Energy Word Search Older Kids.

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#6. More Ideas For Projects About Energy

If your child or teen would like to do a further projects around energy topics, they could research and then write an essay, or do a visual project with drawings, make a presentation or construct/create their own energy project.

Some ideas to get you started:

• Solar energy
• Wind Farms
• Geothermal energy
• Renewable energy
• Home energy improvements
• Build a battery from fruit
• Tidal power

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Online Learning Resources For Research

Below are a list of useful websites and apps with facts, experiments and activities to teach you and your child more about energy.

• Sustainable Energy Authority of Ireland (SEAI)
• Science Foundation Ireland (SFI)
• Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) 
• Office of Energy Efficiency & Renewable Energy US (EERE) Energy 101 video series 

World Earth Day

World Earth Day falls every year on April 22nd and using renewable energy is one way to help the planet. You can also make small changes at home to save energy (and reduce your bills!). From making sure your device chargers are not left plugged in to always turning the lights off when you leave the room even if it’s only for a few minutes.

SSE Airtricity Generation Green

Small choices can make a big difference. By choosing a renewable energy provider, you’re joining the growing numbers moving away from fossil fuels and helping to power a cleaner, greener Ireland.

Over to you now. How did your child get on with the energy activities? Tell us in the comments below, we’d love to hear from you!