1. Teacher Guide
This lesson is designed to teach kids to ask a critical thinking question that you can’t just put into a search box to solve. To do that, we encourage them with smaller questions that search can help them answer. Make sure that you read the notes for each slide: they not only give you teaching tips but also provide answers and hints so you can help the kids if they are having trouble.
Remember, you can always send feedback to the Bing in the Classroom team at You can learn more about the program at bing.com/classroom and follow the daily lessons on our Partners In Learning site.
Want to extend today’s lesson? Consider using Skype in the Classroom to arrange for your class to chat with another class in today’s location. And if you are using Windows 8, you can also use the Bing apps to learn more about this location and topic; the Travel and News apps in particular make great teaching tools.
Alice Keeler is a mother of 5 and a teacher in Fresno, California. She has her B.A in Mathematics, M.S. in Educational Media Design and Technology and is currently working on a doctorate in Educational Technology with an emphasis in games and simulations. EdTech speaker, blogger, and presenter. Founder of coffeeEDU, a 1 hour conference event for educators. New Media Consortium Horizon report advisory panel member. High school math teacher for 14 years. Currently teaching pre-service teachers curriculum, instruction and technology at California State University Fresno. Teaches online for Fresno Pacific University in the Masters in Educational Technology. Passionate that kids are not failures, researches gamification in education to increase student motivation.
This lesson is designed to teach the Common Core State Standard: Mathematics
CCSS.MATH.CONTENT.HSG.MG.A.1 Use geometric shapes, their measures, and their properties to describe objects (e.g., modeling a tree trunk or a human torso as a cylinder).*
CCSS.MATH.CONTENT.HSF.BF.A.1 Write a function that describes a relationship between two quantities.
CCSS.MATH.CONTENT.HSG.MG.A.3 Apply geometric methods to solve design problems (e.g., designing an object or structure to satisfy physical constraints or minimize cost; working with typographic grid systems based on ratios).*

2. Explain how the geometry of a lighthouse is designed to provide maximum peripheral illumination.
© Stephen Frink/Aurora Photos
Having this up as kids come in is a great settle down activity. You can start class by asking them for thoughts about the picture or about ideas on how they could solve the question of the day.

3. Explain how the geometry of a lighthouse is designed to provide maximum peripheral illumination.
Happy National Lighthouse Day! Wait, you mean you didn’t know that was a thing? The origins of the holiday stretch back to 1789 when the United States Congress passed an act to fund and support lighthouses to continue their important work of keeping vital shipping lanes safe. More than two hundred years later, the still-active law prompted the passage of National Lighthouse Day, observed annually on August 7.
One of the purposes of Lighthouse Day was to encourage states to open lighthouses to the public, and to provide a real-world demonstration of the importance of the lighthouse in our nation’s history. As it happens, Alligator Reef Light in the Florida Keys isn’t easily accessible. Though the lighthouse itself isn’t open for tours, the water around it is, as many boaters, snorkelers, and open-water swimmers will attest.
Depending on time, you can either have students read this silently to themselves, have one of them read out loud, or read it out loud yourself.

4. Explain how the geometry of a lighthouse is designed to provide maximum peripheral illumination.1
Image Search
Use Bing images to identify geometric properties of various lighthouses. 2
Video Search
Identify a video that demonstrates a functioning lighthouse. 3
Web Search
Describe the key structural and/or technological developments of the lighthouse over the years. 4
How does a parabolic reflector function? 5
How do angles play a part in peripheral illumination?
There are a couple of ways to use this slide, depending on how much technology you have in your classroom. You can have students find answers on their own, divide them into teams to have them do all the questions competitively, or have each team find the answer to a different question and then come back together. If you’re doing teams, it is often wise to assign them roles (one person typing, one person who is in charge of sharing back the answer, etc.)

5. Explain how the geometry of a lighthouse is designed to provide maximum peripheral illumination.5
Minutes
You can adjust this based on how much time you want to give kids. If a group isn’t able to answer in 5 minutes, you can give them the opportunity to update at the end of class or extend time.

6. Explain how the geometry of a lighthouse is designed to provide maximum peripheral illumination.1
Image Search
Use Bing images to identify geometric properties of various lighthouses. 2
Video Search
Identify a video that demonstrates a functioning lighthouse. 3
Web Search
Describe the key structural and/or technological developments of the lighthouse over the years. 4
How does a parabolic reflector function? 5
How do angles play a part in peripheral illumination?
You can ask the students verbally or let one of them come up and insert the answer or show how they got it. This way, you also have a record that you can keep as a class and share with parents, others.

7. Explain how the geometry of a lighthouse is designed to provide maximum peripheral illumination.1
Image Search
Use Bing images to identify geometric properties of various lighthouses.
(Possible Search Queries: “Lighthouses,” “Lighthouses various,” “Lighthouses examples”)
Sources:
Bing Image Search:
Students should note the typical cylindrical design but also notice how some may be polygonal (octagonal etc) in shape.

8. Explain how the geometry of a lighthouse is designed to provide maximum peripheral illumination.2
Video Search
Identify a video that demonstrates a functioning lighthouse.
(Possible Search Queries: “Tour of a Lighthouse,” “Inside a lighthouse”)
Resources:
Bing Video Search
Lighthouse Days:
Students should note the rotating nature of the lighting mechanism and the importance of constant illumination and maintenance such as cleaning the glass and servicing the lighting components.

9. Explain how the geometry of a lighthouse is designed to provide maximum peripheral illumination.3
Web Search
Describe the key structural and/or technological developments of the lighthouse over the years.
(Possible Search Queries: “Lighthouse technology through the years,” “evolution of the lighthouse”)
Resources:
Wikipedia:
Modern Lighthouse Illumination:
Students should note the technological progressions over the years from wood and coal burning flame to whale oil burning lamp to electric light. Also, lens development progressed from the catropic system (which concentrated emitted light into a single beam) to the Fresnel Lens and beyond.

10. Explain how the geometry of a lighthouse is designed to provide maximum peripheral illumination.4
Web Search
How does a parabolic reflector function?
(Possible Search Queries: “parabolic reflector”, “parabolic reflector lighthouse”)
Sources:
Lighthouse Lens:
Wikipedia:
Paul Scott Info:
“A lighthouse has a very strong lamp at the top. The idea is to project light from this lamp as strongly as possible for a great distance. To do this, the lamp has a parabolic reflector.” The parabolic (U) shape directs the light towards the focus of the parabola creating a concentrated beam of light.

11. Explain how the geometry of a lighthouse is designed to provide maximum peripheral illumination.5
Web Search
How do angles play a part in peripheral illumination?
(Possible Search Queries: “angles of illumination lighthouse”, “lighthouse angles of reflection”, “angles of light lighthouse -angels”)
Sources:
Wikipedia:
Coastal Georgia Historical Society:
By setting the angles of the lens in the reflective surface of the light, to extend the vertical range of light different angles are added above and below the focal point to refract the light with 3 bends instead of 2. The angle of the light is important to ensure that the right things are being illuminated to warn the ships of potential danger in the water.

12. Explain how the geometry of a lighthouse is designed to provide maximum peripheral illumination.
This slide is a chance to summarize the information from the previous slides to build your final answer to the question.