Year 12 Physics students need to learn about electric fields, which are regions in space where electric forces can be felt, like the force which drives electricity to travel from a cloud to the ground during lightning. You may have felt the 'electricity in the air' on a hot muggy day before a lightning storm. This means you were in the presence of a large electric field. 

It is possible to complete an experiment to show electric field lines, but it is a lot harder and messier than looking at magnetic field lines (from magnetic field instead). The shapes of the fields are similar too. Therefore we completed an experiment looking for the magnetic field lines from magnetic fields found around magnets or combinations of magnets.

Students wrapped magnets in gladwrap to make sure the iron filings (little bits of iron) they sprinkled on the magnets would be easy enough to remove afterwards. They placed the magnets under white pieces of paper and sprinkled the iron filings over them to show the magnetic field lines.

Sprinkling the iron filings directly over the magnet allowed the students to see the 3D aspects of the field lines. This is an experiment available at Tūhura.