Science is for Kids

I’ll start out with a disclaimer.  I am not an artist.  I understand that mixing red and blue pigment (or paint) does not produce a true purple.  I’d like to talk about the science behind what is happening in our eyes when we perceive color.  I’ll leave discussion of the color wheel, the true primary colors and what color is produced when red and blue paint are mixed to the artists! It’s important to talk about the difference in how colors are produced by pigments and how color is produced by light.  Let’s start out with light.   The visible spectrum of light goes from a wavelength of 400 nanometers (nm) to 700 nm.  I remember learning the acronym ROYGBiV (Red Orange Yellow Green Blue Violet) in school to remember the sequence of colors in the visible spectrum.  Red light has the longest wavelengths (from about 575-700nm) and the lowest amount of energy.  Violet light has shorter wavelengths (about 400-435 nm) and much greater energy....

A few inches of snow in Maryland allowed me to have a little extra time with my family yesterday.  After my two year old son Crosby’s afternoon nap, my wife and I thought he might like to go outside to play in the snow.  After getting him all bundled up, I took him outside planning on pulling him around the yard in our sled. The sledding lasted all of about 30 seconds.  We spent a couple minutes making and throwing snowballs, but then he got down to business.  He made it very clear he wanted me to get the footballs out and kick them.  For some reason he thinks it’s pretty awesome watching his 42 year old dad trying to place kick and punt.  Or maybe I’m just kidding myself and he thinks it’s hilarious watching me trying to relive my football glory days! Anyway, I couldn’t help but notice that the footballs all seemed pretty deflated when I was trying to kick them.  The balls were really hard to kick, but I could pick them up pretty easily.  ...