Lesson 2 of 9

Energy transfers

Goal: Describe how energy moves between stores.

Puzzles for this lesson

When something happens, energy is transferred from one store to another. One store empties as another fills.

Rolling down, the car gets lower and faster. Its gravitational potential store empties and its kinetic store fills.
Friction and air resistance warm the track and the air. Some energy always ends up in the thermal store of the surroundings.
Energy is transferred by forces, by heating, by an electric current, and by light and sound waves. These are not stores. They are ways of moving energy from one store to another.

Your turn

This lesson’s activity starts here in a moment.

I can name the store that empties and the one that fills.I can describe the transfer for an everyday event.

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Kinetic store Filled when an object speeds up

Gravitational potential store Filled when an object is raised

Thermal store Filled when an object is warmed up

For teachers: AQA 3.3.2 · Pearson Edexcel 28.3 to 28.6 · Cambridge 7Pf.01