Prisms & Dispersion
📋 What it is
A prism bends each colour of white light by a different amount, spreading it into a rainbow.
🗣️ Coach says
White light is a mix of all colours. A prism refracts light — but it bends violet more than red, so the colours fan out into a spectrum. This "splitting" is dispersion, and it’s exactly how raindrops make rainbows in the sky.
🧠 Memory hook
White light = all colours. Prism bends each colour differently → spreads into a rainbow.
😂 Giggle
Why did the concave mirror feel self-conscious?
Everything it reflected was upside down!
😲 Whoa!
Isaac Newton proved white light is all colours by splitting it with one prism, then using a second prism to recombine the rainbow back into white.
✅ Quick check: Why does a prism turn white light into a rainbow?
Say your answer out loud first — then reveal.
White light contains all colours, and the prism bends each colour by a different amount, spreading them out (dispersion).
Dispersion separates colours because each bends differently.
🧪 Try it! (2 minutes)
Hold a prism (or a glass of water at a window) in sunlight and catch the rainbow it throws on paper.