RE: Physics of optics

Hi Barry,

I never taught in high school ---only college, but I did teach a general science class for non-science majors. They seemed to enjoy making a simple telescope. Started by measuring the focal length of several lenses by using an extended light source. Then they made a simple telescope using a long focal length lens and a short focal length lens and measured the magnification and calculated the magnification. Interesting things come up such as: the image is "upside down" (HMMMM why is that?), there is a red-blue halo around the image (This happens if you use simple lenses) , and you can suggest they look backwards through their telescope and try to explain what they see.

Bob Schramm

Check out my web page at: http://www.SchrammStudio.com

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From: Barry Kleider <bkleider@sihope.com>
Reply-To: alt-photo-process-l@sask.usask.ca
To: "alt-photo-process-l@skyway.usask.ca" <alt-photo-process-l@sask.usask.ca>
Subject: Physics of optics
Date: Wed, 17 Aug 2005 08:31:29 -0500

Anyone on the list have experience teaching the physics of optics to high school students?

I'm looking for some fun activities I can use to show the properties of lenses.

Obviously, there's the pinhole camera....

And I've got money to buy up a bunch of junkers we can take apart...

Other ideas - either specific activities or of places I might investigate?

Barry Kleider