I will be teaching first graders how to use simple magnifiers. What are the basic safety rules for magnifiers that I should share with them with regard to sunlight, heat, etc. — JR
The only source of common light source that presents any real danger to a child with a magnifying glass is the sun. If you let sunlight pass through an ordinary magnifying glass, the convex lens of the magnifier will cause the rays of sunlight to converge and they will form a real image of the sun a short distance after the magnifying glass. This focused image will appear as a small, circular light spot of enormous brilliance when you let it fall onto a sheet of white paper. It’s truly an image—it’s round because the sun is round and it has all the spatial features that the sun does. If the image weren’t so bright and the sun had visible marks on its surface, you’d see those marks nicely in the real image.
The problem with this real image of the sun is simply that it’s dazzlingly bright and that it delivers lots of thermal power in a small area. The real image is there in space, whether or not you put any object into that space. If you put paper or some other flammable substance in this focused region, it may catch on fire. Putting your skin in the focus would also be a bad idea. And if you put your eye there, you’re in serious trouble.
So my suggestion with first graders is to stay in the shade when you’re working with magnifying glasses. As soon as you go out in direct sunlight, that brilliant real image will begin hovering in space just beyond the magnifying glass, waiting for someone to put something into it. And many first graders just can’t resist the opportunity to do just that.