I.

Objectives
A. At the end of the lesson, 75% of the students are expected to:
1. describe how short circuit and overloading occurs;
2. determine with interest the causes of short circuit and overload;
3. apply Ohm’s Law to the concepts behind short circuit and overload; and
4. cite some ways on how to prevent short circuit or overloading of a circuit.

B. Answer three (3) out of five (5) items in the multiple choice questions.

II. Subject Matter

A. Unit: Electricity
Topic: Short Circuit and Overload
Concepts:
1. Short Circuit – occurs when current passes through a shortened path in the circuit. This
shortened path may be due to the crossing or touching of uncovered
portions of the wire.

2. Overload – occurs when an electrical wire carries too much current. This is a result of
connecting too many loads or appliances in a parallel circuit making its total
resistance very small.

B. Materials
 Light Bulbs
 Light Bulb Holders
 Connectors
 Circuit Board
 Dry Cells
 Ammeter

C. Reference
 Eulalia, Bertillo N., Physics: Science and Technology Textbook for Fourth Year High
School Students, Book Press Media Inc., 2004 (pp. 174-175)

III. Learning Tasks

A. Routine Activities
1. Opening Prayer
2. Greetings
3. Checking of Attendance
4. Checking of Assignment

Teacher’s Activity Student’s Activity

B. Recall and Motivation

Before we start a new discussion for today

let us first have a game. Our game is
entitled “What is that appliance?” that is
based from the segment of the famous TV-
Animated Series, Pokémon.

The objective of the game is to guess what

are the appliances hidden on the slide that I
will show to you, but in order to have a
chance to guess you have to answer a
question or solve first a problem.

In this game, you have to answer 9

questions, five of which will be simple
questions and the remaining four will be
problem solving items about electricity
consumption.

In the first part you will just look on the table

of appliances with their corresponding
wattages to have a clue on what the
mystery appliance is, but to determine what
really the mystery appliance is, I will give
another clue that will describe the
appliance, while in the second part, you’ll
have to solve the problem first, because the
numerical answers to the problem are the
key to guess the mystery appliance.

You will use the table of appliances with

corresponding wattages in order to
determine or to guess correctly the mystery
appliance.

The person who will answer the question or

solve the problem first correctly will have a
chance to guess and if he/she guessed
correctly our mystery appliance he/she will
get an additional 10 points to his/her
recitation.

EASY LEVEL QUESTIONS

1. Based from your table, what are some

appliances that have wattage of 60
Watts? Give at least two. Laptop and Stereo

MYSTERY APPLIANCE: This appliance is a

sound system, typically including a CD,
tape, or record player, that has two or more
speakers. Stereo

2. Mikee always uses these two appliances

every day.She cannot actually live without
 it. What are these two appliances which
has wattage of 1538 W? Hair Dryer and Hair Iron

MYSTERY APPLIANCE: This appliance is

an electromechanical device designed to
blow cool or hot air over wet or damp hair,
in order to accelerate the evaporation of
water particles and dry the hair. Hair Dryer

3. Christine always uses these appliances

for her breakfast. She will not consider
her breakfast delicious without using
these appliances for the preparation of
her food. What are these three
appliances which has a power rating of Waffle iron, Cappuccino Maker, and Oven
1200 W? Toaster

MYSTERY APPLIANCE: This appliance is

typically a small electric kitchen appliance
designed to toast multiple types of bread Oven Toaster
products.

4. Roselle likes to eat ice cream every

day, so she always uses these two
appliances to freeze her stock of ice Refrigerator and Freezer
creams in their house. What are these
appliances which has wattage of 600 W?

MYSTERY APPLIANCE: This appliance is a

common household appliance that consists
of a thermally insulated compartment and a
heat pump (mechanical, electronic, or Refrigerator
chemical) that transfers heat from its inside
to its external environment.

5. Charlene, a certified KPop fanatic,

always uses these appliances to watch
her bias KPop groups on Korean
channels and to play her bias KPop
albums. What are these two appliances DVD and Television
which has a power rating of 35 W and
300 W respectively?

MYSTERY APPLIANCE: This appliance is a

telecommunicationmedium for transmitting
and receiving moving images that can be Television
monochrome (black-and-white) or colored,
with or without accompanying sound.
DIFFICULT LEVEL QUESTIONS:

1. A certain appliance works for 6 hours. If it 800 Watts

works for that certain time its electrical
energy consumption will be 4.8kWh. What
will be the wattage of the appliance?
Oven (Microwave)
MYSTERY APPLIANCE: Based from your
table, what is the appliance that has
wattage of 800 Watts?

2. Sakae has an appliance which has an 500 Watts

average electrical energy consumption of
0.25 kWh. If he is using it daily for half an
hour, what would be its daily power
consumption? Vacuum Cleaner
MYSTERY APPLIANCE: Based from your
table, what is the appliance that has
wattage of 500 Watts?

3. Brix is always using a certain appliance 0.025 kWh

every day at his office. He is always using
it for quarter of an hour. His appliance has
wattage of 0.1kW. What would its daily
electrical energy consumption?

MYSTERY APPLIANCE: The problem Electric Fan

already gave you the clue for the mystery
appliance from its given quantities. Based
from your table, what is the appliance that
has wattage of 0.1kW?
627 Watts
4. This appliance has an electrical energy
consumption of 0.627 kWh if it is used for
an hour. What is the power consumption
of the appliance? Rice Cooker
MYSTERY APPLIANCE: Based from your
table, what is another appliance that has
wattage of 627 W?

EASY LEVEL ANSWERS

 1. Stereo
2. Hair Dryer
3. Oven Toaster
4. Refrigerator
5. Television SHORT is the word that will be formed from
the first letters of the answers.

What is the word that will be formed out of

the first letters of the easy level answers?

DIFFICULT LEVEL ANSWERS

1. Oven (Microwave)
2. Vacuum Cleaner
3. Electric Fan OVER is the word that will be formed from
4. Rice Cooker the first letters of the answers.

What is the word that will be formed out of

the first letters of the difficult level answers?

C. Lesson Proper
1. Pre-Activity
a. Unlocking of Terms

Before we have our activity, let us first

define some terms that you might encounter Insulation is the use of material to resist the
in our activity or lesson for today. flow of electric current to a certain body.

What do we mean by the word Amperage is the strength of electric current

“INSULATION”? measured in Amperes.

What does “AMPERAGE” mean?

b. Procedure of the Activity

Let us now proceed to our activity for today.

I will divide the class into six groups for our

activities.

There are 3 set ups on the left side and right

side of this room; there are only two
activities for today. Each group has to
perform the two activities, one the left side
and the other on the right side.

The first three groups, Groups 1, 2, and 3,

 will perform the activity 1 first that is located
on the right side of the room, while the last
three groups, Groups 4, 5, and 6, will
perform the activity 2 first that is located on
the left side of the room. Each group has
only 5 minutes to perform each activity and
after doing the first activity, the groups will
exchange places with the group across your
group.

Let us now discuss what you will do in your

activities.

These are the procedures for the activity on

the set ups located on your right side.

1. Connect the circuit as shown in Figure

1(a) below.

Figure 1(a) Figure 1(b)

2. Switch it on. Take note of your

observations.
3. Next, connect a short wire as shown in
Figure 1(b). Observe what will happen.
4. Feel the short wire with your finger. Do
the same to the wire directly connected to
the bulb. Take note again your
observations.

5. Record your observations in the given

table.

These are the Observations

procedure of the
second activity.

1. Set up the circuit as shown in Figure 2.

Connect the ammeter later.

A
 Figure 2

2. Switch the circuit on and carefully

observe the brightness of the bulbs.
3. Connect an ammeter as shown. Observe
and record the current reading in
amperes in the table given.
4. Add another bulb in parallel with the first
one.
5. Switch the circuit on and observe the
brightness of the three bulbs.
6. Repeat Step 3 then open the circuit.
7. Repeat Steps 4 to 6 then repeat Step 3.
8. Record your observations and readings
on the table given.

Number of Bulbs Ammeter Reading

(A)
2
3
4

c. Precautionary Measures

In performing the activities, we should also

observe some precautionary measures to
prevent some accidents that may happen.

1. Students should handle the materials to

be used in the activity with care.

2. Students should observe right handling of

instruments like the ammeter. Wrong
connection of this kind of instrument may
lead to its damage.

For you to be guided on your activity, you

should pattern your observations to these
questions.

Activity 1

1. What happened when a short wire was

connected into the circuit?
2. What have you felt when you touched the
 short wire with your finger? How about
the wires connected directly on the bulb?
3. What do you call this type of electrical
malfunction?

Activity 2

4. What have you noticed about the

brightness of the bulb as you increase
more bulb connected in parallel?
5. How did the current change as you add
more bulbs in the circuit?
6. Where would this lead if the current will
continue to rise in the circuit?
7. What do you call this another type of
electrical malfunction?
8. What are the two kinds of electrical
malfunction based from your activity?

If so, you can now proceed to your

respective groups and perform your
activities.

2. Activity Proper (The students will perform the activities)

a. Performance of the activity

(The teacher will monitor their students

while doing their activities)
It seems that all of you have finished
performing the activities given to you. You
have now to post your table of observations
and results on the board.
(The students will post their table of results
on the board)
(Group 1 will discuss their results on the
board)

Group 1, please discuss your observations Yes Sir.

and results on the board.

Did the other groups get the same (Group 2 will discuss their results on the
observations? board)

Next, Group 2, please discuss your

observations and results on the board. Yes Sir.

Did the other groups obtain the same

observations?

b. Analysis of the Guide Questions

 Let us now try to answer the questions that I
have given to you earlier.
Activity 1
1. What happened when a short wire was
connected into the circuit?
Why do you think the bulb had stopped
functioning?
Where did the current go?
Did the amount of current in the circuit
change?
If the amount of current in the circuit
increases, what do you think will happen
to the resistance?
What is the evidence that the resistance
decreased in the circuit?
2. What have you felt when you touched
theshort wire with your finger? How about
the wires connected directly on the bulb?
Why do you think the short wire was hotter
than the wires connected directly in the
bulb?
When a short wire was connected into the
circuit, the bulb stopped functioning.
It is because the current flowing through the
bulb was blocked by the short wire.
The current now passes through the short
wire back to the source, instead of passing
through the bulb back to the source.
Yes, the amount of current will change. It will
suddenly increase.
Based from Ohm’s Law, if current increases,
resistance decreases, because current is
inversely proportional to resistance.
The shortened path in the circuit, because if
the path was shortened, the length of the
wires in the circuit or the path in which the
current passes will be shorten. We know that
if the length of the wire is shortened,
resistance will decrease.
The short wire was hotter compared to the
wires directly connected to the bulb.
It is because more current passed through
the shortened wire and if there was a large
current, more heat would be produced. From
the expression H= I2Rt, heat is directly
proportional to current, so if current
increases, the amount of heat produced will
also increase.

3. What do you call this type of electrical
malfunction?
Activity 2
4. What have you noticed about the
brightness of the bulb as you increase
more bulb connected in parallel?
5. How did the current change as you add
more bulbs in the circuit?
If the total current increases, what will
happen to the total resistance of the
loads/bulbs in the circuit?
6. Where would this lead if the current will
continue to rise in the circuit?
7. What do you call this another type of
electrical malfunction?
8. What are the two kinds of electrical
malfunction based from your activity?
Short Circuit
As the number of bulbs connected in parallel
increases, its brightness also increases.
As the number of bulbs connected in parallel
increases, the total amount of current in the
circuit increases.
Based from Ohm’s Law, if the current
increases, resistance should decreases,
because current and resistance is inversely
proportional to each other.
If current will continue to rise it will transfer
or produce too much heat. Based from the
expression H = I2Rt, if current increases, the
amount of the heat produced should also
increase.
Overloading
Short Circuit and Overloading.
Short circuit occurs when current passes
through a shortened path in the circuit. This
shortened path may be due to the crossing
or touching of uncovered portions of the wire
while overloading occurs when an electrical
wire carries too much current. This is a result
of connecting too many loads or appliances
in a parallel circuit making its total resistance
very small.
3. Post Activity
a. Generalization

Let us see if you really understand the

concepts behind short circuit and
overloading.

Part of your assignment that I gave to you

yesterday was to create an acrostics of the
word "SHORT" which should include
concepts about short circuit and also of the
word "OVER" which should include
concepts only from overloading, right?

Now, I want groups 1, 2, and 3 to

collaborate their works in making the final
acrostics for the word "SHORT" while
groups 4, 5, and 6 in making their final
acrostics for the word "OVER". It means
that the first three groups will work on
concepts of short circuit while the last three
groups will work on the concepts of
overloading. The exciting part will be the
presentation of your works. You should
present your work creatively. It is now up to
you how you would present your work
creatively. The one with a very good
presentation will get an additional 10 points (Groups 1,2 and 3 will present their work)
to their recitation points. I will give you only (Groups 4,5 and 6 will present their work)
6 minutes to collaborate and prepare your
short presentation.

Are the instructions clear to you class?

You can now start collaborating with the

other groups.

Okay, go back now to your respective

places and let us see what you have done.

Which group now has the best

presentation?

Both groups performed well, so all of you

will get an additional 10 points to their
recitation.
D. Application

It seems that you have understood the

concepts how short circuit and overloading
occurs, but how can we prevent these to
happen?

The appliances in our house are connected

in parallel.

The total current is equal to the sum of the

individual loads in the circuit.

How are again the appliances connected in

your houses? The total current will increase in its amount.

How would you describe again the total
current in parallel connection?
If so, what will happen to the total current if
the number of loads connected in parallel
increases?
Resistance will decrease that will result in a
large increase in current that may cause
great amount of heat to be produced.
Overloading can occur.

What do you think will happen if the total

current will continue to rise? It can damage our appliances and it may
cause fire because of too much heat that will
be produced.

In your houses, what will happen if you We should prevent connecting too many
connect too much appliances in one outlet? loads in one electrical outlet.

Then if overloading occurs, what may

happen to your appliances?

Therefore in order to prevent overloading of

the house circuit, what should you do?

However there are circumstances that Circuit Protectors.

sometimes we forget to follow these
precautionary measures in order to prevent
those from happening. Fuse.
That is why we have here some safety
devices that break the circuits whenever
“overload" or "short circuit" occurs. Do you
have any idea what are they?
The parts of a fuse are the insulated tube
Can you give me one circuit protector that where in its center is the lead strip of low
we usually use? melting point. This melts whenever the
current through it is greater than its current
rating. When the lead strip melts, the circuit
breaks topping the current.
This is what a fuse looks like. Based from
the illustration, what are the parts of the
fuse and how do these parts function? We can usually found it in panel boards.

Where can we usually found this circuit

protector?
It is also found in panel boards.

If your house was built before 70's, you

probably would have fuses. If after that
time, you probably would have circuit Their function is to protect wiring from
breakers. overloading. Both automatically shut off
power to the circuit when an overload takes
place.
Where can we usually found these circuit
breakers?

Even though fuses and circuit breakers look

differently, the serve the same function.
What is that function?

Yes Sir. We've seen it in one of our

We do have another circuit protector. To appliances at home.
identify what is that protector, let me show
you a picture. Ground Wires/Ground Conductor

(The teacher will show a picture of a three

pronged plug)

We usually only have two-pronged plug, It is a ground conductor. It protects us from

what do you think is the third one for? accidental grounding.

Okay. That introduces us to another circuit

protector which is?
 Have you also seen an extra wire in the
metal casing of your appliance? That is also
a ground wire. How does ground
wires/conductor protects us?
If anything goes wrong with the appliance
that results in a direct connection between
the line and the casing, there will be still a
direct electrical path to the station via the
ground.

How if the casing were not connected to the If the casing were not connected to the
ground? ground, all the current would pass through
the person who touches the appliance and
would result in an electrical shock.

Okay. If you see that ground wire on your

appliance, do not remove it, because you Fuse, Circuit breaker, and Ground Wires.
now know its important role in protecting
you and your appliance.

What are again the different circuit

protectors that we use to protect us from
electrical malfunction of our electronic
devices, gadgets or appliances?

E. Value Situation

Jd is to cook dinner for Keihl using electric

stove. She found out that the socket
dedicated for kitchen use is being used by
Johnson who is boiling water. But she has
to cook as soon as possible because Keihl
is arriving soon. Will she wait until Johnson
is done or just plug the stove into an
octopus wiring where two other appliances
are currently connected; a television set and
an electric fan. If you are Jd, what will you
do? Explain.

D. Evaluation
 Choose the letter of the correct answer.

1. Which of the following will happen if the circuit undergoes short circuit?
A. Current in the circuit will decrease and resistance will increase
B. Current in the circuit will increase and resistance will decrease
C. Current in the circuit will remain constant same as with resistance
D. Current in the circuit will fluctuate causing resistance to also fluctuate

2. Which of the following correctly describes the cause of overloading in a circuit?

A. Too many connected loads in one source
B. Too many connected source in one load
C. The rapid increase of resistance in a circuit
D. The rapid decrease of current in a circuit

3. Which would likely happen if there will be a current upsurge in the circuit?
A. There will be a decrease in the power consumption
B. There will be an increase in the resistance
C. There will be a decrease in the voltage
D. There will be an increase to the heat produced

4. The insulation cord of your TV was worn off. Which of the following is the best way to
prevent short circuit from it?
A. Throw the appliance immediately
B. Just be aware not to be in contact with the wire when you use the appliance
C. Never plug the appliance unless the wire is insulated again
D. Try to touch the insulated wire and check whether short circuit will occur

5. Which of the following circuit protectors are used in the different types of wirings or
connections?

I. Switch
II. Circuit Breaker
III. Fuse
IV. Ground Wire

A. I, II, and III

B. II, III, and IV
C. I, III and IV
D. II, I and IV

IV. Assignment

I. Word Study

Define the following terms.

1. Electrocardiogram (ECG)
 2. Electric Shock
3. Electrocution

II. Do the following.

1. List down effects of current on the human body.

2. List down some electrical hazards and safety.

Reference: Physics: Science and Technology Textbook for Fourth Year Students (pp. 179 – 180)