Albert Einstein and Relativity for Kids His Life and Ideas with 21 Activities and Thought Experiments (For Kids series)

146 Pages·2012·30.98 MB·English

by  Jerome Pohlen

Albert

A EinstEin
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t

E
I
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Relativity
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Kids
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His Life and Ideas with 21 Activities
and Thought Experiments
Jerome Pohlen
Albert
EinstEin

Relativity
and
Kids
for

Albert
EinstEin

Relativity
and
Kids
for 
His Life and Ideas with 21 Activities
and Thought Experiments
Jerome Pohlen
Copyright © 2012 by Jerome Pohlen
All rights reserved
First edition
Published by Chicago Review Press, Incorporated
814 North Franklin Street
Chicago, Illinois 60610
ISBN 978-1-61374-028-6
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Pohlen, Jerome, author.
Albert Einstein and relativity for kids : his life and ideas with 21 activities and thought experiments /
Jerome Pohlen. — First edition.
pages cm
Audience: 9 & up
Audience: Grade 4 to 6
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-1-61374-028-6 (pbk.)
1. Einstein, Albert, 1879-1955—Juvenile literature. 2. Physicists—Biography—Juvenile literature.
3. Relativity (Physics)—Experiments—Juvenile literature. I. Title.
QC16.E5P64 2012
530.092—dc23
[B]
2012021342
Cover and interior design: Monica Baziuk
Front cover photographs: Albert Einstein, © Bettmann/Corbis; clock tower, Jerome Pohlen; Space-time
warp, iStockphoto © Arpad Benedek; Einstein tower, Potsdam, iStockphoto © Andreas Bauer; M31 galaxy,
NASA Chandra Space Telescope Collection; pocketwatch, Shutterstock © Tatiana Popova.
Personality rights of ALBERT EINSTEIN are used with permission of he Hebrew University of Jerusalem.
Represented exclusively by GreenLight.
Back cover photographs: Solar eclipse, Courtesy NASA Astronomy Picture of the Day Collection; train,
Shutterstock © makspogonii; Einstein family, Courtesy of the Leo Baeck Institute, New York (F 5373M).
Interior illustrations: Mark Baziuk
Printed in the United States of America
5 4 3 2 1
;
For my father, Joseph Pohlen,
who showed me how much fun science can be
Contents
TIME LInE viii
ACKnOWLEDGMEnTs xi
nOTE TO READERs: Thought Experiments xiii
InTRODUCTIOn: The Patent Clerk xv
1. A Curious and independent Child … 1879–1901 1
...........
Compass and Magnet 5
House of Cards 6
Munich to Milan 8
2. the Patent Oice and the Miracle Year … 1901–1909 17
....
Capillary Action 18
the Photoelectric Efect 25
the speed of Light 30
E = mc2 32
3. special Relativity … 1905 35
...................................
Moving through space 36
Relative Motion 37
simultaneity 38
time Dilation 39
time Dilation, Part ii 40
the twin Paradox 42
the speed of Light on Zozon 43
4. the Professor Without socks … 1909–1919 47
..............
Blue skies and Red sunsets 50
AFTERWORD: Einstein Lives On 113
the Accelerating Elevator 52
Bending Light 55 REsOURCEs 117
solar Eclipse 65 ➤ Books for Further study 117
➤ Websites and Places to Visit 118
5. General Relativity … 1915 67
................................... InDEX 120
6. Fame and Persecution … 1919–1933 73
......................
Other Galaxies 83
the Expanding Universe 84
7. America and the Bomb … 1933–1945 91
.....................
Chain Reaction 101
8. standing Up for Peace and
Human Rights … 1945–1955 103
...............................
sailboat Challenge 105
toying with the Principle of Equivalence 111
time Line

1876 ✦ August 8, parents Hermann Einstein and Pauline Koch marry
1879 ✦ March 14, Albert Einstein born in Ulm, Germany
1881 ✦ november 18, sister Maria (Maja) Einstein born
1887 ✦ Michelson-Morley experiment fails to show the presence of an “ether”
1894 ✦ the Einsteins move to italy
1895–1896 ✦ Albert attends high school in Aarau
1896–1900 ✦ Einstein attends the Zurich Polytechnic institute
1902 ✦ January, Lieserl Einstein born in novi sad, Austria-Hungary
June 23, Einstein begins work at the swiss Patent Oice
October 10, Hermann Einstein dies in Milan
1903 ✦ January 6, Einstein and Mileva Maric´ marry in Bern
1904 ✦ May 14, Hans Albert Einstein born in Bern
1905 ✦ special theory of Relativity published during Einstein’s “Miracle Year”
1909 ✦ Einstein becomes an associate professor at the University of Zurich
1910 ✦ July 28, Eduard Einstein born in Zurich
1911 ✦ the Einsteins move to Prague, where Einstein teaches at German University
the irst solvay Conference held in Brussels, Belgium
1912 ✦ the Einsteins return to Zurich when Einstein accepts position at the Zurich
Polytechnic institute
1914 ✦ the Einsteins move to Berlin, Germany
the Einsteins separate and Mileva returns to switzerland with Hans Albert and Eduard
World War i breaks out
viii
1915 ✦ Einstein announces the General theory of Relativity to the Royal Prussian Academy of  sciences
1916 ✦ General theory of Relativity published in the Annalen der Physik
1918 ✦ november 11, World War i ends with the signing of the Armistice
1919 ✦ February 14, Albert and Mileva divorce
May 29, eclipse conirms General theory of Relativity
June 2, Albert and Elsa Löwenthal marry in Berlin; Einstein adopts Elsa’s daughters,
ilse and Margot
november 6, Astronomer Royal Frank Dyson announces Eddington’s indings
1920 ✦ February 20, Pauline Einstein dies
1922 ✦ Einstein receives the nobel Prize for physics . . . of 1921
1933 ✦ Hitler comes to power in Germany while Einstein is in the United states
1936 ✦ December 20, Elsa Einstein dies in Princeton
1939 ✦ August 2, Einstein sends a letter to President Roosevelt encouraging the development
of the atomic bomb; writes another letter March 7, 1940
september 1, World War ii breaks out when Germany invades Poland
1940 ✦ October 1, Einstein becomes a Us citizen
1941 ✦ December 7, Japan bombs Pearl Harbor; the United states enters World War ii the next day
1945 ✦ May 7, Germany surrenders to the Allies
August 6 and 9, the United states drops atomic bombs on Hiroshima and nagasaki, Japan
August 15, Japan surrenders and World War ii ends
1946 ✦ Einstein named president of the Emergency Committee of Atomic scientists
1948 ✦ August 4, Mileva Maric´ Einstein dies in Zurich
1951 ✦ June 25, paralyzed since 1948 by a stroke, Maja Einstein dies in Princeton
1952 ✦ Einstein declines to become the second president of israel
1955 ✦ April 18, Albert Einstein dies in Princeton, new Jersey
1965 ✦ October 25, Eduard Einstein dies in Zurich
1973 ✦ July 26, Hans Albert Einstein dies in Massachusetts
ix