Light and Color Level: 4th Grade Time Frame: Approximately 1 Quarter  Description:  Students learn that light travels in a straight line; they study about reflection and refraction, how lenses work, and the colors that make up white light.

Overview Activity List Learning Objectives Standards Resources

Learning Objectives

Students will know and be able to demonstrate that:

• We have sight because light is reflected off of objects and to our eyes.
• We can see things only in the presence of light.
• Light can come from a natural or artificial (man-made) source.
• There are only a few sources of light; much of the light that allows us to see things is reflected light.
• Light travels in a straight line.
• When light encounters an object, it can go through the object, be stopped by it, or something in-between (some goes through, some does not).
• When light it blocked or partially blocked by an object, a shadow is formed behind the object.
• When light strikes an opaque surface, varying amounts of light can be reflected (bounced back), depending on the characteristics of the surface.
• Light is reflected at a certain angle (because light travels in a straight line).
• Images reflected from a flat surface are realistic and right-side-up, but they are reversed (left to right).
• Images reflected from curved surfaces are usually distorted, depending upon where the mirror is held in relation to the reflected object. An image reflected from a concave surface is also upside down.
• A transparent or translucent material with a curved surface can change an image seen through the material.
• Concave and convex lenses have different effects on the image that is seen through them.
• Concave and convex lenses bend (refract) light differently.
• When white light passes through transparent materials with certain shapes, the light can be both bent and “separated” so that we see several colors of light.
• When this happens, the colors and their order are always the same: red-orange-yellow-green-blue-indigo-violet, and this sequence of colors is called a spectrum.
• The three primary colors of light are red, green, and blue; the secondary colors are formed when any two of these are combined.

Students will practice:

• Formulating questions on a specific science topic and choosing the steps needed to answer the questions.
• Collecting data for investigations using scientific process skills including observing, estimating, and measuring.
• Constructing charts and visualizations to display data.
• Using data to produce reasonable explanations.
• Reporting and displaying the results of individual and group investigations.

Standards

Illinois State Standards: Late Elementary- As a result of their schooling students will be able to:

12C. Know and apply concepts that describe properties of matter and energy and the interactions between them.

• Describe and compare types of energy including light, heat, sound, electrical, and mechanical.
  

11A. Know and apply the concepts, principles, and processes of scientific inquiry.

• Formulate questions on a specific science topic and choose the steps needed to answer the questions.
  
• Collect data for investigations using scientific process skills including observing, estimating, and measuring.
• Construct charts and visualizations to display data.
• Use data to produce reasonable explanations.
• Report and display the results of individual and group investigations

National Science Education Standards- As a result of activities in grades K-4, students should develop an understanding of the following fundamental principles and concepts:

• Light travels in a straight line until it strikes an object. Light can be reflected by a mirror, refracted by a lens, or absorbed by the object.
• (5-8 standard, introduce only) Light interacts with matter by transmission (including refraction), absorption, or scattering (including reflection). To see an object, light from that object—emitted by or scattered from it—must enter the eye.

Resources

Champaign Community Unit School District #4 * Mellon Administrative Center
703 South New Street * Champaign, IL 61820 * 217.351.3800