Home light show
Scientists investigate light with complicated pieces of equipment, but you can make a start with the everyday objects shown here. If you put them on a tabletop on a sunny day, you will be able to see how light it can be broken up into different colours and how it casts shadows.

How fast does light travel?
Nothing moves faster than light, 299 792 km (186 287 miles) a second. It travels from the Sun to the Earth in around eight minutes, and it can cross the average room in about one hundred-millionth of a second. When light shines through transparent matter such as glass, it slows down by up to a third, but even then, it is still faster than anything else.