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Rainbows are one of nature’s most amazing and beautiful light shows. When sunlight comes down to Earth, the light looks white but is actually made up of different colours that we don’t usually see: red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo and violet.
A rainbow is formed when sunlight enters a raindrop. The light bends as it enters the raindrop and then is reflected off the back of the drop. As the reflected light leaves the raindrop towards you it bends again. The amount the light bends depends on the light’s colour. Red light bends the most, orange slightly less and so on. Violet bends the least. This means we only see one specific colour from each raindrop.

All the red light from a rainbow reaches your eyes at one specific angle, all the orange light at a different angle and so on. This is why rainbows appear in an arc with bands of colour.

You can only see a rainbow when the rain is in front of you at a distance and the sun is behind you, low on the horizon. A rainbow is an optical effect and is not a physical object that can be touched.

The lower the sun is in the sky, the taller the rainbow.

You can never find the end of the rainbow as a rainbow is an optical illusion. When you move, the rainbow moves too.

If you are very high up, it is possible to see a circular rainbow. These occur when the arc continues below the horizon. They are mainly visible from aeroplanes. Here you can see an amazing circular rainbow around the setting sun. It was created by tiny ice crystals in the atmosphere on a cold winter’s day.

Such atmospheric conditions can also produce an upside-down rainbow.

You can sometimes see double rainbows. These are known as secondary rainbows. The larger rainbow looks like the shadow of the brighter rainbow because the sunlight is reflected twice within the same raindrop. But look carefully! Notice in the second rainbow the colours are reversed. This happens because the light is being bent twice inside the raindrops.

Rainbows can also occur at night when the moon reflects the white light of the sun whilst it is raining.

Rainbows can be created by many forms of water in the air. These include not only rain, but also mist, sea spray, waterfalls and steam from factories.

Rainbows in bubbles
Rainbows in CD’s
Rainbows in oil spills

Some people use acronyms to help them remember things. The acronym Roy G. Biv helps people to remember the colours of the rainbow in the correct order.

Another way of remembering things is to use mnemonics. This is where words are used in a phrase to aid memory. For example, the sentence, ‘Richard of York Gave Battle in Vain’ is a mnemonic to remember the colours of the rainbow in the correct order.

Red Orange Yellow Green Blue Indigo Violet

Can you think of your own phrase to help you remember the colours of the rainbow in the correct order?

Since ancient times people have thought that rainbows are special. In Greek mythology rainbows were thought to be a path between Earth and Heaven.

The rainbow was called the Bridge in Norse mythology, connecting Asgard, the home of the gods with Midgard, the home of the humans.

In Irish myth, the end of the rainbow was the leprechaun’s hiding place for his pot of gold. Of course, we know that we cannot reach the end of a rainbow because if we walk towards a rainbow it seems to move farther away.

Many poets and songwriters have written about rainbows. Perhaps the most famous song is “Over the Rainbow” sung by Dorothy in the Wizard of Oz. Dorothy imagines that there is a magical land over the rainbow where skies are always blue and dreams really do come true.

If you attach your sunlight rainbow crystal to a sunny window in your home, you will see tiny rainbows dancing around your room on a sunny day. When the white sunlight enters the crystal, it is refracted into its full spectrum of colours. The crystal is acting as a prism – traditional prisms are triangular.

Please download here for rainbow experiments and looking at prisms.