Light Experiments

One day this sumer ... back at the end of May...

Scholar was heading out the door to play

when he saw this ....

on the pantry door.

What was it?

What made it?

How did it get there?

He had been watching Magic School Bus - the Rainbow tape,

so he had a good idea of the solutions to some of his questions.

Pretty soon, he found this cup,

It didn't take long for him to work out red cup sunshine outside.

And as he looked around and studied the situation over the next hour, he found new lines, and noticed that they were moving.

Over the next few weeks, this became an obsession with him.

He experimented with other cups. He realized that this only happened a during supper meal prep time. And he figured out that it had to do with the setting sun coming through the west facing kitchen window.

Pretty soon, he was discussing his observations, and theories with Sunshine.

Experiments became more complicated. Water in the cup

Different amounts of water in the cup.

with fascinating results

He worked on colors of cups including clear cups eventually.

He began searching for other light sources to produce the rainbows.

He also noticed that interesting patterns would emerge shortly before the rainbows.

And then it started raining. And his friendly rainbows stopped visiting.

Finally, the reflections came back, but now they were during and toward the end of supper. He was puzzled. He never quite figured that one out.

He discovered that cups left in other places put rainbows in new locations.

Eventually, he stopped finding rainbows. Between rain and a busy household, he has stopped looking. Plus, unknown to him, the angle of the sun will no longer come in the window and the best time to look is mid afternoon. This will definitely be something that we will continue to pursue, as well as solving the puzzle of the moving rainbows, the changing time of the rainbows, and missing rainbows.