Probably best suited for the older kids. After teaching this a few times, I remain convinced the kids get it and just want to learn more and more. They do need it spoon feed to them so it is easy to understand and it must include experiments so it is not a lecture. It is a fun few sessions and the kids feel quite accomplished learning all this new and different material.

I am also amazed that while I didn’t start learning this kind of stuff until sophmore year of college, they are getting it now. Kids are staying up late in China and India to learn this and be good at it, we need our kids to be as prepared. The knowledge base has expanded exponentially since we were their age. This is an example of why I like scouting, it facilitates exposure to slices of life they normally just would not get.

 energy-mb.pdf

energymb.ppt   < title page for 2008, new requirement

There is an interesting website with all kinds of home-made science toys/experiments. It’s called sci-toys.com. You may want to incorporate some of these into the program. Just in case the site goes down, here is a printout of their thermodynamic experiments:  scitoys.doc

My original thought was to have a working Stirling engine created for the class, but I ran out of time.

You may want to hook up with your local utility for instruction material. All the bigger companies have someone in corporate communications who is responsible for training. The video I used to start the class – “What is Energy” (a National Geographic film) was borrowed from our utility. It was really good and a great transition into the energy conversion exercise/demos.

Note that BSA changed the requirements in Jan 06. This is one MB where they just watered down the knowledge requirement for the worse. I think the older requirements could have been upgraded, but they did not get it right.

Here is an energy MB handout somebody created for a few of the new requirement (good for the home energy audit/auto analysis):

scout-energymbworkshop.pdf

See the graphic I posted under Brick-a-brac of an illustration of how much surface area is required for solar to power the world.

Here is something new, the American Petroleum Institute (API) has just put together a website to help work through this merit badge:

          http://www.classroom-energy.org/merit_badge/

Update Note: I’m teaching this again right now in our MB college (3/08). I’ll post new notes when I have a chance. I’ve actually been able to use quite a number of my old slides. I’ve reread and reappraised the Boy Scout Energy Merit Badge booklet- it is as bad as I originally thought. Use something else to teach this one. I did not find the API web link I posted above to be that useful either. Good effort, but misses the mark.