Experimental Approach to High School Physics

with an Emphasis on the Scientific Method

Light

The highlight of this section is allowing the students to measure the speed of light. This problem will stretch the student's problem solving abilities. We may not be able to find the speed of light be we will be able to set a lower limit on its speed and that will be quite an accomplishment. While establishing a lower limit, we will learn more about errors and how to propagate errors through our mathematical analysis.

Look Around the Corner—Does Light Travel in a Straight Line?

Left and Right in the Mirror—Reflection

Spear Fishing—Diffraction

Rainbows—Prisms

Hidden Information in Rainbows—Spectroscopy

That Looks Weird—Line Emission and Continuous Emission Light

Under the Magnifying Glass—Lenses I

Seeing in the Dark—Lenses II

Another Way to do the Same Thing—Parabolic Mirrors

Thin Lens Approximation

Eyeglasses, Telescope and Microscopes

Generating Electricity from Light—Photoelectric Effect

Generating Heat from Light—Solar Heating

Now You See It, Now You Don't—Transparency and Opacity