Process:
What we did to learn about how waves react when they hit a surface was to use differently shaped spheres as our waves. We rolled the balls at a wall, and followed their paths with marker. To conduct this experiment, we used styrofoam spheres, a small, pink, plastic ball, a marble, a big marble, a ping pong ball, and a golf ball.
The small marbles never even made it to the wall. They curved to the right before they could touch it. The pink plastic ball hit the wall and came almost straight back down. The big marble hit the wall at an angle and came back down the opposite way, forming a triangle-like shape. The ping pong ball made another point, and the golf ball made one twice on each trial. Lastly, the styrofoam ball hit the wall and came straight back down.
Conclusion:
I think that the results of our experiments mean that waves/spheres will bounce off any surface they hit, and go in the direction of the angle opposite to the one they hit the wall at, creating peaks. If the wave hits the barrier straight on, then it will come straight back. If it hits it going this way: /, it will come back this way: \, and vice-versa. This is called reflection. It makes sense, because if there was an imaginary mirror reflecting the wave, it would look like a reflection! That is basically what a wave does when it hits a surface.
Very good. You clearly understood the activity. Now, one thing you could do to make your blog post better would be to include an image of what the paper looked like at the end, so we could see the patterns too. Or at least a google image.
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