Chapter on Air Pressure

Air might appear to be very light but we have hundreds of miles of air above us. Just like a single sheet of paper doesn't weigh much but  a bundle of paper is heavy, all that air above us weighs a lot and  gives rise to "air pressure" or "atmospheric pressure".  How much is it?  The atmosphere (the air around us and above us) exerts pressure of roughly 14 pounds per square inch. That is, on a regular letter-size paper (8.5x11in), this amounts to roughly 1,300 pounds! That might be hard to believe, but hopefully the following activities will convince your child that air does indeed exert a lot of pressure.

  1. Is that sheet of newspaper really that heavy?
  2. The card that defies gravity.
  3. Is that a cap or a tap?
  4. Sorry, we don't any more space here.
  5. The paper stays dry.
  6. The candle that became thirsty.
  7. Don't scoff at air pressure.
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