Waves unit reflection

This is a bubbl.us I made about everything I have learned in this unit about waves. (or the main ideas)

The study and use of waves affects societal well- being in many ways.

By studying water waves we can predict tsunami, using buoys to detect changes in water levels and strong water currents and waves under the ocean. By predicting tsunami we help people prepare themselves against it and save millions of lives. Seismic waves are also a way of predicting natural disasters. By detecting waves in the earth using an instrument called a seismograph that we also learned about, we can see if any particular large waves are approaching, and in this way too we can prepare and protect ourselves against natural disasters.

By studying waves humans have also found out about the electromagnetic spectrum. Using Gamma rays, we can irradiate our food, meaning take out harmful bacteria and illnesses to keep us safe. This helps us stay healthy, or at least that’s what we think so far. (see previous blog post.)

By studying waves we have also discovered the benefits of sound, which are today used in our everyday lives. From studying sound, we have discovered how to break the sound barrier, enabling our rockets and fast of transportation to travel faster than the speed of sound. From sound we also now know about noise pollution, and about damage it causes to your hearing. From this we have also been able to investigate solutions, to benefit society. (see essay on blog) Overall, the use and study of waves has definitely affected societal well- being and the world would be a completely different place without all types of waves.

What did you learn during the unit? (Looking at the picture you drew-how has your knowledge changed?)

Looking at my picture from the beginning of this unit, my knowledge of waves basically started at 0, since I drew a beach and a big wave at sea. Now, my knowledge has expanded a great deal, and I can name all types of waves and give some basic information about them, such as visible light waves, microwaves, gamma rays, sound waves, water waves and seismic waves. I can also locate different parts of waves such as crests (top) and troughs (bottom). I now know a lot of wave properties too, such as frequency, pitch, wavelength, ext. We have also learned about instruments, and how they use waves to produce sound. Mainly, it is only the string instruments that produce sound using waves, but all the instruments we have produce sound waves. Some facts I have learned are; waves travel faster in solids than in liquids, and faster in liquids than through gas,the way sound waves bounce back and forth in a room is called acoustics, we use things called cones in our eyes to see the visible light waves and the color with the longest wavelength is red and the color with the shortest wavelength is violet.

What did you like?

Something that I really liked and that is memorable to me from this unit is all of our labs. My favorite lab was the one with the tubs filled with water, and when we observed how water waves traveled. Then we also added one and later two barriers, and saw how the wave would diffract. It was kind of weird and fun watching two waves crossing into each other but still having their own shape , so sort of two things happening at the same time. We also had a lab with tuning forks, in which we compared sound waves. We saw how the density of the materials we would bang the tuning fork on would transmit the energy and cause different sounds, and have the waves reach your ear at different times. We also had a lab in which we tied a string to the ground and shook it creating waves, which we then measured the wavelength of. I think that it was fun and a good way to start off the unit, since waves can be really confusing when starting from scratch, like I did.

What would you change or add for next year's grade 7 students?

I don’t think that I’d do any major changes to the wave unit for next year. I think that it’s a fun balance between trying out things on our own through labs and textbook work. It sort of makes waves fun but serious. I think that since waves is a unit that we can actually relate to and see with our own eyes in everyday life it’s good that we do labs, and we should include all the activities that we can. Something else that I think we should have done is to have spent some more time on the electromagnetic spectrum waves. It felt kind of rushed, and I think that maybe we should have had some more readings or informational things too, since we only really focused on our own presentations. Another thing that we have done and next year’s 7^th grade students should continue doing is watch Bill Nye science clips, since they’re fun and informative!