Magnetic Sparks

It all started in 2019, when I was asked to prepare a class about electricity for young children.. I could choose the topic myself, and at the time we were designing motors and generators at university. That made me wonder whether I could build a small generator at home using only a magnet and some thin copper wire.

I still remember the moment the LED first flickered to life. It happened with only a small movement of the magnet, but I was genuinely excited—even though I already understood the theory behind it. I immediately thought, This is it. I built the class around the experiment, and the children loved it.

The idea stayed with me for the next few years. At first, I imagined creating only a kit, but the more I thought about it, the more I realised that seeing an LED light up is not the same as understanding why it happens. The experiment creates the excitement, but the explanation gives it meaning. That was when the idea for the book really began to take shape.

The whole book is built around one central principle: a changing magnetic field can generate electricity. It starts gently with atoms, electrons, voltage and current, then slowly connects those ideas to magnets, coils and a working generator. The style is playful, but everything is based on real physics.

I spent more than a year writing, rewriting and returning to the same explanations until they felt simple without losing the science behind them. At the same time, the kit developed from the original workshop version—with hundreds of hand-wound turns—into a practical, plastic-free generator made from laser-cut plywood.

Together, the book and kit became exactly what I had hoped to create: something children could understand, build and remember. It is simply the kind of book and experiment I would have loved to have as a child, and I hope it inspires other curious young minds.