What is conduction?

Conduction is when heat moves from one thing to another by touching.

Imagine you're holding a spoon in a pot of soup that’s just boiled. The end of the spoon gets hot first, and then the middle, and finally your hand feels the heat too. That’s conduction, the heat travels through the spoon because it's touching each part along the way.

Think about playing a game where you pass a hot potato around. The person holding it feels the heat, then they pass it to the next person, and now they feel it. That’s like how conduction works, the heat moves from one part to another, just like the hot potato moves from hand to hand.

You see conduction every day! When you touch a cold doorknob in winter, the cold feels like it's moving into your hand. Or when you put your hands near a hot stove, the heat moves through the metal and warms them up, just like that spoon in the soup.

Conduction is simply heat traveling through touching things, one step at a time!