MS-PS4-2: Modeling How Waves Are Reflected, Absorbed or Transmitted
In plain English: MS-PS4-2 is the NGSS middle school performance expectation that asks students to develop and use models, such as labeled drawings, simulations and written descriptions, to describe how light and sound waves are reflected, absorbed or transmitted by different materials. The work is qualitative. It is usually taught in grade 6, 7 or 8 physical science.
Develop and use a model to describe that waves are reflected, absorbed, or transmitted through various materials.
Clarification Statement: Emphasis is on both light and mechanical waves. Examples of models could include drawings, simulations, and written descriptions.
Assessment Boundary: Assessment is limited to qualitative applications pertaining to light and mechanical waves.
Next Generation Science Standards · Disciplinary Core Idea: Waves and Their Applications in Technologies for Information Transfer · Official standard
Students build and use models of what happens when a wave meets a material. A wave can be reflected (it bounces back off the surface), absorbed (its energy is taken in by the material, which often warms a little) or transmitted (it passes through the material). Most materials do some of each: a window transmits most light but also reflects a little, which is why you can see a faint reflection in it at night. Students work with two kinds of waves: light and mechanical waves, waves that need a material to travel through, such as sound, water waves and waves on a rope. A model here is a way of showing what happens, such as a drawing with arrows, a computer simulation or a written description.
The NGSS Clarification Statement says: "Emphasis is on both light and mechanical waves. Examples of models could include drawings, simulations, and written descriptions." The Assessment Boundary says: "Assessment is limited to qualitative applications pertaining to light and mechanical waves." Students describe behaviors with words such as more, less, most and some, and lab readings are used only to compare and rank materials. All data on this page are invented for teaching. The labs use LED flashlights and phones: never shine a flashlight into anyone's eyes, and never use a laser pointer.
Learning Objectives
By the end of this lesson, students will be able to:
Describe reflection, absorption and transmission of light and of mechanical waves, with an example of each
Develop a drawing model with arrows that shows what a material does to a wave, including what happens to the wave's energy
Use a simulation and a written description as models to predict how a wave will behave at a new material
Use lab evidence to compare how well different materials reflect, absorb or transmit light and sound
Prior Knowledge Required
Students should already be comfortable with:
Light reflecting from objects and entering the eye lets us see them 4-PS4-2
Waves carry energy, and a bigger amplitude carries more energy MS-PS4-1
Objects let light through fully, partly or not at all 1-PS4-3
Darken the room. Shine an LED flashlight at a small mirror, then at a sheet of wax paper, then at black construction paper, while students watch the wall and the space behind each material.
Warm-Up Prompt
"The same light hit three materials. Where did the light go each time? Make a quick sketch for each one with arrows."
Collect the sketches without correcting them. Introduce the three words, reflected, absorbed and transmitted, and tell students they will improve these sketches into models during the lesson.
Direct Instruction15 minutes
Three behaviors, one energy story. When a wave reaches a new material, its energy is split three ways: some is reflected, some is absorbed and some is transmitted. The material decides the split. Smooth, shiny and hard surfaces reflect more. Dark materials absorb more light, and soft, porous materials absorb more sound. Clear materials transmit more light; for sound, solids, liquids and gases such as air transmit it, but empty space cannot. In a drawing model, a thicker arrow means more energy (Diagram 2).
Light at a flat, shiny surface. The normal is an imaginary line straight out from the surface. Light bounces off a flat mirror at the same angle from the normal as it came in (Diagram 1).
Drawing model: a mirror and a white wall (light reflected)
A flashlight shines on a bathroom mirror, then on a white painted wall. Both look bright, but only the mirror shows a picture of the flashlight.
Result: Model: draw one arrow in and one arrow out at the same angle for the mirror. For the white wall, draw one arrow in and many short arrows out in all directions. Both reflect most of the light; the smooth mirror sends it one way, so it forms an image, while the rough wall scatters it.
Clear and tinted car windows (light transmitted and absorbed)
Invented data for sunlight on two car windows: a clear pane transmits about 90%, reflects about 8% and absorbs about 2%; a tinted pane transmits about 35%, reflects about 10% and absorbs about 55%.
Result: Model: draw the arriving arrow splitting into three. The tinted pane has a thin transmitted arrow and a thick absorbed part, so less light enters the car and the glass itself gets warm. The numbers are only to compare the two panes.
Echoes in a gym (sound reflected and absorbed)
Claps echo loudly in an empty school gym with bare concrete walls. After soft foam panels are hung on the walls, the echo is much weaker.
Result: Written model: "The bare wall reflects most of the sound back, so we hear an echo. The foam panels absorb most of the sound energy into the foam, so less comes back. Only a little sound passes through either wall." Diagram 2 shows the same model as a drawing.
Sound through a desk (mechanical wave transmitted)
A student lightly scratches one end of a long wooden desk. A partner hears it faintly through the air, then much more clearly with an ear pressed to the other end of the desk.
Result: Written model: "The wood transmits the sound wave well, because its particles are packed closely and pass the vibration along. In a room with no air at all, the scratch could only reach you through the desk." Sound always needs a material to be transmitted.
Simulation model: a wave on a string
In the free PhET simulation Wave on a String, students send a pulse along a string with three settings: a fixed end, no end, and damping turned up.
Result: Fixed end: the pulse comes back (reflected). No end: the pulse leaves the screen as if into more string (transmitted). Damping: the pulse shrinks as it goes, because its energy is taken out (absorbed). One simulation models all three behaviors of a mechanical wave.
After each example, ask: "Which behavior is biggest here? What is your evidence? How did the model show it?" Point out that each model is a different tool: a drawing shows direction and amount, a simulation lets you change one thing at a time, and a written description explains why.
Guided Practice15 minutes
As a class, build a model of sunlight reaching a clear mountain lake on a summer day. First fill in the evidence table, then turn it into a drawing and a two-sentence written description.
Building the lake model
Evidence you can observe
Behavior it shows
Arrow in the drawing
Glare off the surface when you look from the side
?
?
You can see the sandy bottom near the shore
?
?
The water is warmer by afternoon
?
?
Fill in the behavior for each row: reflected, transmitted or absorbed.
Draw the lake surface, an arriving sunlight arrow, and an arrow for each behavior. Decide which arrow should be thickest near the shore.
Write the model in two sentences, using the words reflected, absorbed and transmitted.
Predict: how would the drawing change for a muddy pond?
Independent Practice30-35 minutes
Groups rotate through Flashlight Stations (Activity 1) and the Sound Box Test (Activity 2). For each lab, each student draws one model with arrows that matches the evidence and writes a two-sentence description that names all three behaviors.
Collect the models. Check that the arrows split the arriving wave into parts instead of making new energy, that the thickest arrow matches the data, and that sound models never show sound crossing empty space.
Closure15-20 minutes
Groups finish the Model Gallery (Activity 3) and critique one other group's models with the checklist. Then each student completes the exit ticket.
Exit ticket: "Return to your warm-up sketches. Redraw one of them as a model with arrows of different thickness, and label each arrow reflected, absorbed or transmitted." Check that the new drawing shows where all the light went.
Differentiation Strategies
For Struggling Students
Give a word bank with a picture for each behavior: a ball bouncing off a wall (reflected), a ball landing in sand (absorbed), a ball rolling through an open door (transmitted)
Provide drawing templates with the material already drawn, so students only add and label the arrows
Pair each written description with a drawing first, then remove the drawing once students can describe it in words
For Advanced Students
Ask students to model why a wet road at night shows bright glare from headlights while a dry road does not
In the PhET Bending Light simulation, have students describe how the reflected and transmitted beams change as the angle of the beam changes, in words only
Ask students to design a wall for a music room that lets light in but keeps sound from getting out, and to draw a model for both waves
Assessment Guidance
What to Look For
Check that every model accounts for the whole wave: the arriving arrow is split into reflected, absorbed and transmitted parts, with thicker arrows where there is more energy. Look for evidence tied to each behavior (glare, seeing through, warming, echoes, muffled sound). Listen for students who think black objects reflect darkness, that a filter adds color, that absorbed energy disappears, or that sound can travel through empty space.
02
Classroom Activities
3 Activities
1
Flashlight Stations
25 minGroups of 3
Groups shine an LED flashlight on five materials, measure the light that gets through and the light that bounces back, and test which paper absorbs more sunlight.
Procedure
Hold the flashlight 20 cm from a light sensor (or a phone light-meter app) and record the reading with nothing between them.
Hold each material over the sensor and record the light that gets through. Then hold the sensor beside the flashlight, facing the material, and record the light that bounces back.
Materials: clear plastic, wax paper, white paper, aluminum foil, black paper.
Absorption test: put a thermometer under a sheet of white paper and another under black paper in direct sunlight by a window for 15 minutes.
Safety: never shine the flashlight into anyone's eyes, and never use a laser.
Sample Data (invented)
Nothing in the way: 1000 lux. Through / bounced back: clear plastic, 900 / 40; wax paper, 450 / 250; white paper, 150 / 600; aluminum foil, 0 / 800; black paper, 0 / 30. Sunlit papers, starting at 22 °C: white paper 25 °C and black paper 31 °C after 15 minutes.
Discussion Questions
Which material transmitted the most light? Which reflected the most?
Two materials let no light through. How do the readings show that one of them reflects and the other absorbs?
How does the sunlit-paper test support your answer for black paper?
Draw a model with arrows for wax paper, which both transmitted and reflected a large share. Its two readings add up to only 700 lux: besides being absorbed, where else could some of the light have gone? (Wax paper absorbs little; much of the missing light was scattered off to the sides, where neither reading caught it.)
Modification for Distance Learning
Students shine a phone flashlight on household materials (a plastic bag, a paper towel, foil, dark cloth) and describe what they see on the wall and behind the material, or they draw models from the sample data.
2
Sound Box Test
25 minGroups of 3-4
Groups line a shoebox with different materials, play a steady tone inside, and measure how much sound gets out. Then they test echoes in the hallway.
Procedure
Place a phone playing a steady tone at medium volume inside a shoebox and close the lid. Hold a second phone with a sound-level app 30 cm from the box and record the reading.
Repeat with the box lined with an aluminum baking tray, a folded towel, and a foam packing sheet. Keep the volume, phone positions and lid the same each time.
Echo test: stand 5 m from a bare hallway wall and clap once; then repeat facing a wall with coats or blankets hanging on it. Describe the echoes.
Safety: keep the volume at a comfortable level, below what you would use for music.
Sample Data (invented)
Sound-level readings outside the box (a higher reading means louder): no lining, 64; aluminum tray, 61; towel, 53; foam sheet, 50. Echo test: a sharp echo from the bare wall, almost none from the wall with hanging coats.
Discussion Questions
Which lining let the least sound out? Which behavior explains that?
The shiny tray changed the reading only a little. Where did most of the sound go when it hit the tray?
Write a two-sentence model that explains both the box results and the echo test.
Modification for Distance Learning
Students test pillows, towels and a metal pot around a phone at home, or write and draw models from the sample data.
3
Model Gallery
20 minGroups of 4
Each group gets one of 4 scenario cards and makes three models of it: a drawing, a simulation run and a written description. The class then critiques the 12 models in a gallery walk.
The 4 Scenario Cards
Card 1: Sunlight reaches a pond with lily pads.
Card 2: Sunlight shines through a stained-glass window into a dim room.
Card 3: Noise from a hallway reaches a classroom with the door closed.
Card 4: Thunder from a storm reaches a house with its windows closed.
Three Models per Card
Drawing: arrows of different thickness, labeled reflected, absorbed and transmitted.
Simulation: use PhET Wave on a String (for sound and water waves) or PhET Bending Light (for light) to show the behavior that matters most, and record a screenshot or a sentence about the setting used.
Written description: 3-4 sentences that explain what the material does and why.
Gallery checklist: all three behaviors considered; arrows match the evidence; no energy appears from nowhere; light and sound treated correctly.
Modification for Distance Learning
Groups post their three models on a shared slide deck and leave one checklist comment on another group's slides.
03
Diagrams & Visual Aids
2 diagrams
Diagram 1: A Drawing Model of Light at Three Materials
A mirror reflects most of the light, with the angle in equal to the angle out (40° from the dashed normal here). Clear glass transmits most of the light and reflects a little. Black cloth absorbs most of the light, and the energy warms the cloth. Arrow thickness shows more or less light.
Diagram 2: Sound at a Bare Wall and a Foam Wall
A model of the gym in Example 3. The arriving sound is split into reflected, absorbed and transmitted parts, and the thickness of each arrow shows its share. The bare concrete wall reflects most of the sound (a strong echo); the foam panels absorb most of it. Very little sound gets through either wall.
04
Homework Assignment
~30 min
MS-PS4-2 Homework: Modeling Reflection, Absorption and Transmission
Directions: For drawings, use arrows of different thickness and label each one reflected, absorbed or transmitted. Use words like more, less, most and some; no calculations are needed.
Part 1: Develop Models (Problems 1-3)
A car is parked in the sun with its windows up. (a) Draw a model of sunlight reaching the windshield and the dark dashboard inside. Show what is reflected, absorbed and transmitted at each. (b) Use your model to explain why the inside of the car gets hot. (c) A shiny folding sunshade is placed behind the windshield. Add it to your drawing and explain how it helps.
Your neighbor plays music, and you hear it through the wall between your homes, but quieter. (a) Write a written-description model (3-4 sentences) of what the wall does to the sound. (b) Predict how the sound would change if the wall had a thick layer of soft insulation inside it, and explain why.
Waves in a swimming pool reach the tiled wall at one end and bounce back toward the swimmers. Competition pools have gutters at the edges and floating lane lines that calm the water. (a) Draw a model of a wave reaching a bare tiled wall. (b) Draw a second model showing a wave reaching a wall with a gutter. (c) Explain, using the words reflected and absorbed, why the second pool is calmer.
Part 2: Use Models (Problems 4-6)
A flashlight shines on four fabric samples. Behind the thin white cotton, the wall glows dimly. Behind the black wool, the wall stays dark, and the wool feels warmer after 10 minutes. The shiny silver fabric looks very bright from the front, and no light reaches the wall behind it. The fine net curtain lets almost all the light through. (a) For each fabric, name the behavior that is largest. (b) Which fabric would you choose for a window shade that keeps a room cool, and why? (c) Draw a model for the white cotton.
A recording studio has thick foam shapes on its walls. (a) Use a model to explain what the foam does to the sound of a singer's voice. (b) Predict what a recording would sound like if the foam were removed and the walls were bare. (c) Why might the studio also have a heavy door?
A red apple sits on a table. (a) Write a model explaining why it looks red in white sunlight, using the words reflected and absorbed. (b) Predict how it looks under pure blue light, and explain your prediction. (c) Describe how you could test your prediction safely in a dark room.
Rubric
Criterion
Full Credit (2 pts)
Partial Credit (1 pt)
Drawing Model
Arriving wave split into labeled reflected, absorbed and transmitted arrows, with thickness matching the material
Arrows present but one behavior is missing or the thickness does not match
Written Model
Names each behavior and explains why the material causes it
Names the behaviors without explaining why
Using the Model
Makes a correct prediction for a new material or setting and supports it with the model
Prediction correct but not tied to the model, or tied to the model but partly wrong
05
Quiz: 20 Questions
Interactive, with answers
Instructions
Questions are about light and mechanical waves such as sound and water waves. No calculations are needed. For short-answer questions, a drawing or a written description is a model.
Multiple choice: pick an option to check it. Short answer: write your answer, then reveal the model answer.
0 of 20 answered · 0 correct
Question 1 of 20 · Multiple Choice
Which of these is an example of a wave being transmitted?
Answer: B
Transmitted means the wave travels on through the material and comes out the other side, as light does through a clear bottle. Choices A and D describe reflection. Choice C describes absorption, where the wave's energy is taken in by the material and warms it.
Question 2 of 20 · Multiple Choice
You look into a bathroom mirror and see your face clearly. What does the mirror mostly do to the light that hits it?
Answer: D
A smooth, shiny mirror reflects most of the light that hits it, which is how the light from your face comes back to your eyes. If the mirror absorbed the light (A), it would look black; if it transmitted the light (B), it would act like a window.
Question 3 of 20 · Multiple Choice
On a sunny afternoon, a black asphalt playground feels much hotter than a white concrete sidewalk next to it. Which model explains this?
Answer: A
Dark surfaces absorb more of the light that reaches them, and the absorbed energy warms them. White concrete reflects more of the light away. Choice B gets the effect of reflection backward: reflected light leaves the surface and does not warm it.
Question 4 of 20 · Multiple Choice
A frosted bathroom window lets light into the room, but you cannot see clearly through it. What does the frosted glass do to the light?
Answer: C
The room gets light, so the glass transmits light, but its rough surface sends the light off in many directions, which blurs the view. Choices A and B cannot be right, because some light clearly gets through.
Question 5 of 20 · Multiple Choice
You can hear voices from the hallway through a closed classroom door, but they sound quieter than with the door open. Which model fits?
Answer: A
Some sound energy passes through the door (transmitted), which is why you still hear the voices, and the rest bounces back into the hallway or is absorbed by the door, which is why they are quieter. Choice C would mean silence, and choice B would mean no change.
Question 6 of 20 · Multiple Choice
A hiker shouts toward a cliff across a canyon and hears her voice again a second later. What happened to the sound?
Answer: D
An echo is reflected sound: the sound wave bounced off the hard cliff and traveled back to the hiker. If the cliff had absorbed the sound, or if it had passed through the rock, she would hear no echo. Choice C forgets that the energy has to go somewhere.
Question 7 of 20 · Multiple Choice
A band wants its practice room to have fewer echoes. Which material on the walls would help most?
Answer: B
Soft, thick materials absorb sound: the sound energy goes into the fibers instead of bouncing back. Hard, smooth surfaces like glass, metal and stone (A, C, D) reflect most of the sound and make more echoes.
Question 8 of 20 · Multiple Choice
A student draws a model of light hitting a flat mirror. The incoming ray makes a 35° angle with the dashed line straight out from the mirror (the normal). Which drawing of the bounced ray is correct?
Answer: C
For a flat mirror, the angle the light comes in at equals the angle it goes out at, measured from the normal, so the bounced ray is at 35° on the other side. Choice A doubles the angle, and choice D measures from the mirror surface (90° - 35° = 55°) instead of from the normal.
Question 9 of 20 · Short Answer
Write a short written-description model (3-4 sentences) of what happens to sunlight that reaches a pond. Include reflection, absorption and transmission.
Sample: "Some sunlight is reflected off the pond's surface, which is the glare you see when you look at it from the side. Most of the light is transmitted into the water, which is why you can see plants and rocks near the bottom. As the light travels down, the water and the bottom absorb it, so deep water looks dark and the pond warms up during the day." Full credit names all three behaviors with evidence for each.
Question 10 of 20 · Multiple Choice
Two astronauts outside a space station cannot hear each other shout. When they press their helmets together, they can hear each other faintly. Why?
Answer: B
Sound is a mechanical wave, so it needs a material. Space has almost no particles to carry it, but the solid helmets in contact pass the vibration from one to the other: they transmit it. Choice A mixes up light and sound, and choice C is impossible because there is nothing in space to reflect the sound.
Question 11 of 20 · Multiple Choice
White light shines on a sheet of green plastic, and green light comes out the other side. What does the plastic do?
Answer: D
A colored filter transmits light of its own color and absorbs most of the other colors. Choice A is a common misconception: a filter cannot add color, only remove it. Choice C has the behavior backward, which would make the light behind the filter look reddish or purplish, not green.
Question 12 of 20 · Short Answer
Draw (or describe in words) a model of how foam ear cushions on headphones keep outside noise from reaching your ears. Use arrows for sound and label what is reflected, absorbed and transmitted.
Sample model: an arrow for outside sound arrives at the cushion. A thin arrow bounces off the outside (reflected), most of the arrow ends inside the foam (absorbed, the energy goes into the foam), and only a thin arrow continues to the ear (transmitted). The label explains that the soft foam absorbs much of the sound energy. Full credit shows all three, with the transmitted arrow thinner than the arriving one.
Question 13 of 20 · Multiple Choice
Ocean waves reach two harbor walls: one is a smooth, upright concrete wall, and the other is a sloping pile of big rough rocks. Which prediction fits a wave model?
Answer: A
A smooth, upright wall sends much of the wave straight back. A sloping pile of rough rocks breaks the wave up, and its energy goes into moving water through the gaps and into the rocks, so less comes back. Choice C has the two walls swapped.
Question 14 of 20 · Multiple Choice
In a light simulation, a beam shines from air into a block of glass. The beam inside the glass is almost as bright as the arriving beam, and a faint beam goes back up into the air. What does the simulation model?
Answer: B
The bright beam inside the glass is transmitted light, and the faint beam going back into the air is reflected light. Choice C breaks the energy story: a material cannot add light energy. Choices A and D each ignore one of the two beams the simulation shows.
Question 15 of 20 · Short Answer
After a heavy snowfall, a neighborhood seems unusually quiet. Use a wave model to explain why.
Fresh snow is full of tiny air spaces between the flakes, like a sponge, so it absorbs much of the sound energy that reaches it instead of reflecting it. With less sound bouncing off the ground and roofs, less sound reaches your ears, and the neighborhood seems quiet. A strong answer contrasts snow with hard pavement, which reflects sound.
Question 16 of 20 · Multiple Choice
A swimmer with her head underwater hears a motorboat clearly, even though it is far away. What does this show about water?
Answer: A
The sound reached her ears through the water, so water transmits sound. Sound is a mechanical wave, and liquids pass the vibration along from particle to particle. Choices B and D would mean she hears nothing, and choice C is contradicted by what she hears.
Question 17 of 20 · Multiple Choice
A student's model says: "A black T-shirt reflects all the light, which is why it looks black." What is wrong with this model?
Answer: C
An object looks black because it absorbs most of the light that hits it, so very little reflects back to your eyes. That absorbed energy is also why a black shirt warms up in the sun. Choice A is backward: white objects reflect the most light.
Question 18 of 20 · Short Answer
A building has one wall made of large glass windows and another made of thick brick. Use a model to predict what each wall does to sunlight and to traffic noise from the street.
Sunlight: the glass transmits most of the light into the room (and reflects some, which is the glare outside); the brick transmits none, reflects some and absorbs the rest, so it warms in the sun. Noise: both reflect some sound back to the street, but more sound is transmitted through the thin glass than through the thick, heavy brick, which absorbs and reflects more of it. Full credit treats light and sound separately.
Question 19 of 20 · Multiple Choice
Which evidence would best show that a material absorbs light?
Answer: D
Absorbed light energy stays in the material and warms it, and light that is absorbed does not come out the other side. Choice A is evidence of reflection, and B is evidence of transmission. Choice C is reflection from a smooth edge.
Question 20 of 20 · Short Answer
A classmate wrote this model of why we see the moon: "The moon makes its own light, and the light travels to Earth." Critique the model and rewrite it with the right wave behavior.
The moon does not make its own light. A better model: "Sunlight travels to the moon. The moon's rocky surface absorbs some of the light and reflects the rest in many directions. Some of the reflected light travels to Earth and enters our eyes, so we see the moon." Full credit names reflection as the behavior that lets us see it and keeps the light's path from the sun to the moon to the eye.
0 of 20 answered · 0 correct
06
Frequently Asked Questions
10 Questions
What does MS-PS4-2 mean?
MS-PS4-2 asks middle school students to develop and use a model to describe that waves are reflected, absorbed or transmitted through various materials. The code means Middle School, Physical Science, core idea 4 (Waves), performance expectation 2. The practice is developing and using models.
Does MS-PS4-2 include calculations?
No. The Assessment Boundary limits assessment to "qualitative applications pertaining to light and mechanical waves." Students compare with words like more, less and most. Lab readings, like the light-meter numbers in Activity 1, are used only to rank materials.
What kinds of models count for MS-PS4-2?
The Clarification Statement names drawings, simulations and written descriptions. A drawing uses arrows for the wave's path and energy, a simulation lets students change one thing and watch the wave respond, and a written description explains what happens and why. A strong lesson uses all three.
Can a material reflect, absorb and transmit at the same time?
Yes, and most materials do. A window transmits most light, reflects a little (you see your reflection at night) and absorbs a little. A model should show how the wave's energy is shared among the three behaviors, not pick only one.
Why do both light and sound appear in MS-PS4-2?
The Clarification Statement puts the emphasis on both light and mechanical waves. Sound is a mechanical wave, which needs a material to travel through, while light can travel through empty space. Comparing them helps students see what is the same (all three behaviors) and what is different.
Why can I see my reflection in a window at night but not during the day?
Glass always reflects a little light and transmits most of it. In the day, the bright light transmitted from outside is much stronger than the faint reflection of the room, so you do not notice the reflection. At night, little light comes in from the dark outside, so the faint reflected light from the bright room is what you see.
Is bending of light part of MS-PS4-2?
Partly. When light is transmitted from air into water or glass at an angle, its path bends at the surface, and a qualitative description of that bending fits this standard. Calculating angles with a formula is beyond this standard and belongs in high school physics.
What safe materials can I use for MS-PS4-2 labs?
LED flashlights, mirrors, foil, papers, plastic sheets, cellophane, glasses of water, towels, foam, shoeboxes and phones. Avoid laser pointers, which can damage eyes, and remind students never to shine any light into a person's eyes. Keep sound volumes comfortable.
How does MS-PS4-2 connect to MS-PS4-1?
MS-PS4-1 shows that a wave's energy depends on its amplitude. In MS-PS4-2, absorption takes energy out of a wave, so the transmitted or reflected wave has a smaller amplitude, which students hear as quieter sound or see as dimmer light.
What comes after MS-PS4-2?
In high school, HS-PS4-5 asks students to communicate how devices such as solar cells, fiber optics and medical imaging use wave behavior, including reflection, absorption and transmission. MS-PS4-3, at the same level, uses waves to send digital signals.
07
Related Standards
5 standards
These standards connect to MS-PS4-2: prerequisites to review first, parallel standards at the same level, and next steps that build on it.
Before this lesson
4-PS4-2Prerequisite
Model how light reflecting from objects and entering the eye lets us see them
Lesson coming soon
1-PS4-3Prerequisite
Investigate how materials placed in a beam of light let light through or block it
Lesson coming soon
Alongside
MS-PS4-1Parallel
Use math to describe waves, including how amplitude relates to energy
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