Experiments with Ultra Violet Light

Before the Easter holiday we set up some experiments to see how sunlight would affect paper. The children cut out shapes and placed them on card or sugar paper. They then put the paper/card on the window ledge and left them for 3 weeks.

Here are the results:

You can see the outlines of the black shapes really clearly on the sugar paper; in fact the part of the paper that was exposed to the sunlight was almost bleached white and looks as though it has shadows on it where the shapes were dislodged a little. The red colour of the sugar paper was protected by the shape and a strong colour remained underneath it. 

The orange card didn't fade quite as well as the sugar paper but you can still see the shapes if you look really carefully. 

Some shapes were moved off the paper/card during the experiment so there was no outline to see.

Jake suggested that the shapes were acting like sun cream on our skin, preventing the sunlight from reaching the paper or card underneath.

There was no doubt that the sunlight affected the paper/card.