Starter questions

Discussion of photographs of sound mirrors and what they were used for.

Practice exam question comparing  sound and light waves

Demonstration of light travelling in a straight line .

Mini whiteboards - drawing ray diagrams to show how we see and BEST  questions.

Quick practical to  prove the law of reflection using ray boxes.

Law of reflection simulation and discussion of the difference bewteen specular reflection and diffuse scattering.

Peppers Ghost Demonstration or IOP alternative

Discussion of use of Peppers Ghost in theatre

Showing where the image is formed and describing its nature.

Self paced interactive about drawing the ray diagram for the image formed in a plane mirror

Simulations for drawing the ray diagram formed by a plane mirror 1 2 3

Optional: Reflection in a plane mirror from reality to a ray diagram

Drawing a ray diagram step by step on 1cm squared paper (students draw along with the video)

Drawing a ray diagram step by step on white paper with a protractor (students draw along with the video)

Plenary discussion - What have you learnt in today's lesson.

Optional: Cheat method to quickly draw ray diagrams in the exam

Extension: Mirascope / floating coin illusion with curved mirrors.

Starter Questions

BEST questions to review refraction (assumed knowledge from KS3 or GCSE waves topic)

Optional: BEST instructions to introduce the practical

Complete the appropriate GCSE required practical for your GCSE specification.  Use videos to show how to trace the rays and measure the relevant angles.  You will need to get the instructions from the relevant exam board.

1. AQA - measuring angles of incidence, reflection and refraction when light is entering the block.

2. OCR - measuring angles of incidence and refraction just for entering the block.

3. OCR option 2 - drawing an incident ray at chosen angle and then measuring the angle of refraction for the ray entering the block.

4. OCR - Refecetion from a plane mirror

5. Edexcel - measuring all the angles for light entering and leaving the block

Discuss findings and results

Exam question from appropriate past paper.

Starter questions

Ray box dispersion practical filling in observations on the ray diagram or drawing their own.

Alternative: Dispersion with a triangular prism in the phet bending light simulation.

BEST Question on dispersion

Introduce key terms (hopefully familiar from KS3)

Quick fire questions about why different objects look different colours (could use mini whiteboards).

Students draw diagrams illustrating why different objects appear different colours.

Demonstration to show how the appearance of different coloured objects changes under different coloured light.  

BEST gap fill absorb / reflect.

Students discuss how to change a Brighton football kit into a Bournemouth one with coloured light, try it and then write explanation an explanation.

Interactive - what will different characters look like under different light.

Fun coloured filter demonstration

Demonstration of action of coloured filters (or could do practical with ray boxes)

Simulation to predict the appearance under different coloured lights and through different filters.

Starter questions

Discussion of crystal ball fires including suggesting how the ray diagram might look.

Discussion of uses of lenses in everyday life and Katharine Blodgett

What happens to parallel rays when they hit a convex/converging lens - demo or practical using ray boxes.

Notes on Convex lens

Practical making the three different kinds of image with a convex lens:

• Enlarged virtual image

• Diminished real image

• Enlarged real image

What are the steps to draw a ray diagram using step by step diagram and sequence activity.

Students draw ray diagrams on 1cm squared paper using step by step videos.  Video 1.   Video 2 (virtual image)

BEST Questions about lens rays diagrams.

Student practice drawing ray diagram on squared paper.  Instructions.  Optional template.  Solutions.  

Review ray diagrams with solutions.

Discuss careers that might use lenses.

Optional: Ray diagram simulations 1 and 2

Starter Questions

What happens to parallel rays when they hit a concave/diverging lens - demo or practical using ray boxes.

Notes on concave lens

Practical - looking through a concave lens and describing the nature of the image.

Introduce ray diagrams and simulations 1 and 2.

Students draw ray diagrams on 1cm squared paper using step by step video.

Students try more example ray diagrams on 1cm squared paper with optional templates.  Check with solutions.

Optional: 6 easy steps to draw lens ray diagrams for your exams summary video with template.

Discuss uses of concave lenses and sight correction.

Simulations for long and short sight. 1 2 3 4.

Exam questions practice (print some past ray diagram exam questions from your exam board) for students to complete.

Starter questions

Physics is magic or not demonstration.   Don't explain it now.  Students will have to explain it later!

Demonstration of total internal reflection with a laser and water tank.

Student practical to observe total internal reflection and measure the critical angle with protractor OR without protractor.

Students draw ray diagrams for angle of incidence less than, equal to and greater than the critical angle.

Optional: simulations to create total internal reflection: 1 and 2.

Discussion of everyday examples of total internal reflection and introduce optical fibres.

Demonstration of total internal reflection in a stream of water.

Demonstration of total internal reflection along a model optical fibre.

Optional: Demonstration using an optical fibre transmission kit.

Discussion of where the first optical fibre link in a public phone network was.

Simulation of total internal reflection in an optical fibre.

Student try to explain the physics is magic or not demonstration.  Ray diagram solution explanation in the PowerPoint slides.

Discussion of bike reflectors.

Review of topic.