Watch the video

See how electrons flow.

Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kYwNj9uauJ4

You can change the speed to 0.75x to make it easier to listen.

Electricity is carried to the house from power stations via high voltage towers

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What is electricity?

Electricity is a form of energy and is useful because it can be easily converted into types of energy that we need e.g. heat, light, sound and so on.

We get our electricity from sources such as power station and batteries. In Brunei, our power stations uses natural gas to generate electricity.

Current

An electric current is a flow of electrons. It flows from the negative terminal to the positive terminal. The path where current flows is known as a circuit.

In conventional current, the current flows from the positive terminal to the negative terminal. This is because scientist that discovered current flow did not know about electrons yet.

To measure current, we use an instrument called an ammeter. The S.I. unit of current is the ampere (A).

A typical ammeter found in schools

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Modern digital multimeter can measure both current and voltage

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Measuring the voltage of a lemon battery

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Voltage

Voltage is the amount of energy required to push the charge e.g. electrons.

To measure voltage, we use an instrument called a voltmeter. It is measured in the S.I. unit of volt (V).