Following winter break, we began a unit on Sound and Light by exploring the nature of waves in a small wave pan.

Examples of water wave reflection, refraction, diffraction, and interference allowed students to begin to understand how both sound and light waves travel.

Students wrote a short research paper on a musical instrument of their choice, then created their own homemade instruments. They explained how instruments change pitch and volume due to vibrations and resonance, then demonstrated by playing a 3-5 note song. “Hot Cross Buns” was clearly the preferred tune for most of the class!

An artistic extension with Mrs. Hectorne encouraged students to turn sound into art—they listened to different genres of music and were inspired to draw how it made them feel.

Spectroscopes break the visible light spectrum into its component parts. Students were able to observe the spectra from many types of light bulbs to compare their unique light signatures.

They also cycled through visual perception stations to test their visual acuity, determine whether or not they are colorblind, and learn how optical illusions can trick the brain.

Due to the number of snow days, the class was unable to fit in time to dissect cow eyes as planned. Instead, they filled in the names of the parts of the eye and ear on diagrams. However, one ambitious student wanted to do the dissection at Quiet Study with other curious students looking on.

The final activities last week included experimenting with static electricity and electric circuits and schematics.