Having some fun with air pressure // Homemade Science with Bruce Yeany

A recent visit to my old classroom resulted in some fun demonstrations with air pressure. A few materials such a small vacuum cleaner, garbage bags, and tape are used to present classic examples of pressures changes such as vacuum packing students in a plastic bag and lifting students using a garbage bag "pillow" all leading up to the final challenge of trying to see if I can lift the whole classroom using the pressure exerted by one small shop vacuum.

The activity to find the total amount of pressure exerted on a person's body can roughly be accomplished by covering them with news paper and then removing it and laying it flat and measuring the number of square inches. The pressure is then found by multiplying the area by 14.7 PSI. The Exploratorium has an excellent writeup on this investigation and can be found online
https://www.exploratorium.edu/snacks/skin-size.

One additional note; Although we did not show it, we had sanitizing wipes and liquid sanitizer hand lotion available in the room and outside and encouraged students to use them after each activity