RAY TRACING

The principle rays are introduced and students draw scaled ray diagrams to predict the nature, position, size and orientation of real and virtual images formed by concave and convex lenses and mirror. Magnification is defined and this is related to the distance of the image and the object from the lens or mirror. 

What you need ?

10 cm focal length convex lens and lens holder, 10 cm focal length concave mirror and mirror holder, Candle, screen, nail or base and stem of slotted masses, 10 cm focal length concave lens and lens holder, 10 cm focal length concave mirror and mirror holder, 10 cm focal length convex mirror and mirror holder   

IMAGES FORMED BY CURVED MIRRORS

Students use what they have learned about images formed by lenses to investigate those formed by curved mirors. Very little direction is given in this experiment as it parallels the previous one on lenses. 

What you need ?

10 cm focal length concave mirror and mirror holder, 10 cm focal length convex mirror, Candle and Screen, Nail or base and stem of 50 g slotted masses   

EXPERIMENT : IMAGES FORMED BY LENSES

Students investigate the real and virtual images formed by concave and convex lenses. The method of parallax to locate images is first developed using real images formed by a convex lens and then proven to be true by projecting the images onto a screen. The position of the object is changed and the effect on the nature, position, size and orientation is investigated. Parallax is then used to locate virtual images formed by convex and concave lenses. 

What you need ?

10 cm focal length convex lens and lens holder, 10 cm focal length concave lens, Candle and screen, A block of wood with a large thick nail that protrudes above the lens when in the holder or the base and stem of 50 g slotted masses   

We've tried the other day and it showed that when using the concave lens, the image can be clearly seen on the screen and with the same size but when with convex, the image is magnified.

EXPERIMENT : MULTIPLE IMAGES IN PLANE MIRRORS

Hi guyss, try this out. It's coool :D

Students set up two plane mirrors touching at one edge and vary the angle between them. They find the relationship between the number of images formed and the angle between the mirrors.

THE PLANE MIRROR

Students investigate the reflection of light of a plane mirror. They use their findings to locate the image formed by a plane mirror. They predict the minimum sized mirror that will just enable the whole face to be seen as the image. This is checked with a plane mirror a a piece of a paper with a window cut in it to size. 

What you need ?

Light/Ray box, Plane mirror from ray box kit, Protractor, 30 cm ruler, Plane mirror with dimensions greater than half the width and height of the face. A mirror tile is suitable, Piece of paper as big as the mirror, Scissors  

EXPERIMENT : THE EYE

Students investigate how the eye locates images and the optical illusions that occur if light changes dirEctions after leaving the source. Apparent size is related to the angle subtended at the eye by the an object. Why objects are seen to have colour and fatigue of the eyes ability to sense the same colour are investigated. Lastly, students find their blind spot when one eye is open. 

What you need ?

Ray/light box kit, Large piece of matt black paper or material, Red, white, yellow, green and blue squares of cardboard, Red filter, Spectroscope    

PRISM

Newton's decomposition of sunlight with a prism

Isaac Newton was born the year Galileo died. He graduated from Trinity College, Cambridge, in 1665, then holed up at home for a couple of years waiting out the plague. He had no trouble keeping himself occupied.

The common wisdom held that white light is the purest form (Aristotle again) and that colored light must therefore have been altered somehow. To test this hypothesis, Newton shined a beam of sunlight through a glass prism and showed that it decomposed into a spectrum cast on the wall. People already knew about rainbows, of course, but they were considered to be little more than pretty aberrations. Actually, Newton concluded, it was these colors — red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, violet and the gradations in between — that were fundamental. What seemed simple on the surface, a beam of white light, was, if one looked deeper, beautifully complex.