Period 2 Triangular Prism Experiment

Today we continued to do the triangular prism experiment we started yesterday.

For the first activity,you have to shine the laser through the triangular prism, you must include:

• a prediction
• test observations/drawing about what you saw
• conclusion

My group's prediction was the light will reflect off everywhere. During our testing, we observed the light went everywhere. Laser beams were everywhere you looked. We concluded the light refracted and reflected off the sides of the prism.

For the second activity, you have to shine a flashlight through the triangular prism, you must include:

• observations
• describe what you saw(facts)
• draw a picture that explains what you saw
• Explain why the thing you saw happens
• Relate it to something(analogy)

My group and I observed that it makes a rainbow.The order of the colors were red,orange,yellow, green,blue, and purple. We also saw shapes on the sides of the triangular prism such as triangles, trapezoid.etc. We described that when shining the flashlight through the triangular prism the light goes to the opposite side of the flashlight and drew how the light rays go through the triangular prism. We explained that the rainbow can be seen because speed changes causing light waves to change causing colors to form. We related this to a rainbow forming after a rainstorm because it goes through same concept. The light goes through raindrops causing the colors of the spectrum to be formed.

To learn more about a rainbow and how its formed go to this website:

http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/farid/sciencekids/rainbow.html

AR