I wonder... what is refraction?

As an introduction to our light unit, the students went to Oakland's Wonder Room! They completed some investigations where they got to experiment with refraction and reflection! Here are Alyssa's thoughts:

In the first station we learned about how light uses water to play tricks on our eyes. You put a penny in water. The light reflected off the penny and made it look like there was another penny on the top of the water. It used refraction with light.

In the second station there was a puzzle piece and you put it behind a full cup of water. The puzzle piece looked bigger. The water was like magnifying glass. I think the light refracted off of the cup.

In the third station you could put a pencil in the water and it looked like it was split in half. The reason the pencil did that was because the light hit the water and traveled a bit slower than in air which made the pencil look different. It was all because the light was bending different ways in the water.

In the forth station you can observe a newspaper. First you put drops of water on the newspaper and it would look bigger. Second you put magnifying glass. Finally you put a clear marble and the words on the newspaper looked bigger. Our teacher said it was all about light refracting.

By,

Alyssa H.