To recreate Sir Isaac Newton’s investigation, the children used bubbles in place of glass prisms! The children discovered that when light travels from air through a transparent material, it refracts, or bends and a rainbow can be seen!

This is what Isaac Newton observed, and it made him realise that although light looks white, it is actually made up of all the colours of the rainbow! When these colours merge together, it looks white to our eyes. This happens because each colour within a ray of light has a different wavelength.

Red has the longest wavelength, and violet has the shortest. When a ray of light travels from air through a transparent material, it refracts. Since each colour's wavelength is slightly different, the colours in the ray of light bend slightly differently. This causes them to separate and become visible to our eyes.

Objects appear one colour or another because of how they reflect and absorb certain colours of light.