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CD Spinner
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In this activity, learners create a simple “top” from a CD, marble and bottle cap, and use it as a spinning platform for a variety of illusion-generating patterns.
Amazing Albedo
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In this experiment, learners work in teams to investigate how the color of a surface influences its ability to reflect light and therefore heat.
Rotating Light
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In this activity, learners explore what happens when polarized white light passes through a sugar solution.
Water Illusions: Refraction & Magnification
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Learners demonstrate how water can distort, refract and magnify light.
Bubble Tray
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In this activity, learners use simple materials to create giant bubbles.
Cylindrical Mirror
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In this activity, learners create a cylindrical mirror to see themselves as others see them.
Iridescent Art
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This is a quick activity (on page 2 of the PDF under Butterfly Wings Activity) that illustrates how nanoscale structures, so small they're practically invisible, can produce visible/colorful effects.
Water Sphere Lens
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In this activity about light and refraction, learners make a lens and magnifying glass by filling a bowl with water.
Seeing Your Retina
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In this quick optics activity, learners use a dim point of light (a disassembled Mini MagLite and dowel set-up) to cast a shadow of the blood supply in their retina onto the retina itself.
Glue Stick Sunset
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In this activity, learners explore why the sky is blue. Learners model the scattering of light by the atmosphere, which creates the blue sky and red sunset, using a flashlight and clear glue sticks.
Kaleidoscope
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In this activity, learners build inexpensive kaleidoscopes using transparency paper and foil (instead of mirrors).
What does Color have to do with Cooling?
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In this demonstration/experiment, learners discover that different colors and materials (metals, fabrics, paints) radiate different amounts of energy and therefore, cool at different rates.
Opti-Top
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In this activity, learners will create an optical illusion top. Learners will explore color mixing, physics and design through this activity.
How Our Environment Affects Color Vision
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In this lab (Activity #1 on page), learners explore how we see color.
Three Colors of Light
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Have fun with additive mixing! Observe what happens when the three primary colors of light--red, green and blue--are mixed together, resulting in white light.
Personal Pinhole Theater
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Have you ever heard of a camera without a lens? In this activity, learners create a pinhole camera out of simple materials. They'll see the world in a whole new way: upside down and backwards!
How does the Atmosphere keep the Earth Warmer?
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In this activity, learners simulate the energy transfer between the earth and space by using the light from a desk lamp desk lamp with an incandescent bulb and a stack of glass plates.
Luminescence
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In this two-part activity about luminescence, learners explore the chemistry that happens inside glow sticks and other light producing reactions.
Sliding Gray Step
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How can you make one shade of gray look like two? By putting it against two different color backgrounds! This activity allows learners to perform this sleight of hand very easily.
Slide Projector Activities
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This resource contains several mini-explorations using a slide projector as a light source to investigate light and the properties of images.