2004 Ministry Of Education Malaysia. All Rights Reserved.

1
Lesson Plan

Lesson: Curved Mirrors



Aim: To learn study the information of images by spherical mirrors

Lesson objectives
In this lesson, students should be able to

use the relationship
2
R
f = for curved mirrors.
draw ray diagrams to show the formation of images by concave mirrors and convex mirrors.
derive and use the formula
v u f
1 1 1
+ = .

Assumed Prior Knowledge
Students should be familiar with

the laws of reflection of light
geometry involving tangent of an angle


Activity Descriptions

Activity 1
Derivation and use of the relationship
2
R
f =

Activity 2
Students learn to draw ray diagram for concave and convex mirrors

Activity 3
Students learn to derive and use of the mirror equation.










2004 Ministry Of Education Malaysia. All Rights Reserved. 2
Development of Lesson

No. Steps Strategy Resources
1. Introduction The introduction shows the use of convex
mirrors in shops and concave mirrors as
cosmetic mirrors.
LCD projector

Teachers laptop computer

Multimedia courseware

2 Students activity









Summary of activity
Teacher project activities of lesson on the
screen

Teacher starts the activities one by one by
following the instruction in the plan, followed
by questions and answers.

Teacher together with the students
summarizes the lesson.

Activity 1:
Students learn the various terms for
spherical mirrors, and derive the
relationship
2
R
f =

Activity 2:
Students learn to draw ray diagrams
showing the formation of images by
spherical mirrors.

Activity 3:
Derivation and use of the curved mirror
equation.

LCD projector

Teachers notebook computer

Multimedia courseware
3 Worksheet Teacher distributes the worksheets to the
students.

Students answer the questions for their
homework.

Completed worksheets to be collected by the
teacher for marking.

Printed copies of worksheets
4 Extension activity Students are asked to look for further
information by:

Surfing the Internet using the search engines
like Yahoo or Alta Vista or Googgle

Looking up text references

Suggested websites

Recommended text references




2004 Ministry Of Education Malaysia. All Rights Reserved. 3
Answers to Worksheet

Question 1
(a) Focal length,
2
R
f =

2
40
= cm

= 20 cm

(b) (i) In the ray diagram, the concave mirror is represented by a straight line.




















Image distance = 60 cm

(ii)


















Image distance = - 30 cm
object
image
Concave mirror
F
object
image
Concave mirror
F

2004 Ministry Of Education Malaysia. All Rights Reserved. 4
Question 2


















(a) Image is 10 cm behind the convex mirror.
(b) Height of image is 1.7 cm

Question 3

(a) Object distance = 2 f
(b) Object distance is less than f
(c) Object distance = 1.5 f
(d) Object distance > 2 f
(e) Object at infinity


Question 4

(a) Since the image is upright and magnified, the mirror used is a concave mirror. A convex mirror produces
only diminished images.
(b) Object distance, u = 1.5 cm
Since the linear magnification = 5 and the image is upright, the image must be virtual.
Image distance, v = - 5 u
= - 7.5 cm
Using the mirror equation,
v u f
1 1 1
+ =


5 . 7
1
5 . 1
1

+ =

f = 1.9 cm
object
image
Convex mirror
F

2004 Ministry Of Education Malaysia. All Rights Reserved. 5

Question 5

(a) The wing-mirror produces images which are upright and diminished (smaller than object).
Hence it must a convex mirror. Upright images produced by a concave mirror are magnified.

(b) Focal length,
2
R
f =


2
20
=

= -10 m

Image distance, v = -0.25 u (negative, because image is virtual)

Using
v u f
1 1 1
+ =


u u 25 . 0
1 1
10
1

+ =

u = 30 m


Question 6

(a)










The point P is considered as a virtual image, image distance, v = -25.0 cm
Focal length, f = 5.0 cm

Using
v u f
1 1 1
+ =


25
1
0 . 5
1 1

=
u


u = 4.2 cm
P
25.0 cm

2004 Ministry Of Education Malaysia. All Rights Reserved. 6
(b) Linear Magnification m =
u
v


=
2 . 4
25


= 5.95


Question 7
(a) Focal length,
2
R
f =


2
0 . 40
=

= 20.0 cm

Object distance, u = 8.0 cm

Using
v u f
1 1 1
+ =


0 . 8
1
0 . 20
1 1
=
v


v = -13.3 cm
(b) Linear magnification, m =
u
v

=
0 . 8
3 . 13

= 1.66

(c) Height of image = 1.66 x 5.0 cm
= 8.3 cm


Question 8

A convex mirror is used because
It has a wider field of view.
The image is upright and gets bigger as the object approaches the mirror.