The Colours of a Rainbow

My bugs have been busy investigating and learning about rainbows. Unfortunately, it has been far too cold here for any rain, so we haven’t actually got to witness any rainbows in the sky, but that doesn’t mean we can’t be creative and make rainbows of our own!

My boys love watching Sid the Science Kid; it is a show on PBS featuring an inquisitive preschool boy, named Sid, who actively seeks answers to simple scientific questions. I PVR all the episodes so my bugs can watch them whenever they (or I) need some quiet time. I remembered one of the episodes was titled A Rainbow Everyday, so I figured this would be a good place to begin our rainbow investigation. FYI, there is a great song in this episode that Teacher Suzy sings about the colours of the rainbow, but the link is only available if you live in the US :(. M loved the song, and memorized the order of the rainbow colours (ROYGBIV) after hearing the song on the show. Here are a couple rainbow songs you can use to teach the colours of the rainbow:

Making Rainbows

After watching Sid the Science Kid: A Rainbow Everyday, I gave M an old DVD and told him to experiment by seeing if he could use the DVD to make a rainbow. Right away he noticed the surface of the DVD reflected rainbow colours. I told him his challenge was to make a rainbow appear on a piece of white paper using only the DVD and sunlight.

With a bit of help, M was able to catch the sun’s rays just right so they reflected off of the CD and projected onto the white paper. The CD broke up the white light of the sun into 7 different colours: red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, and violet.

When we were finished making rainbows, M drew a lovely, colourful rainbow in his science journal and I recorded some of the facts M learned about rainbows below his picture.