In Social Studies this month, the Prime Academic Preschool students are learning about “Optical Illusions”. First, we discussed the meaning of “illusion” and compared it to “reality”. Sometimes, what we see is not what we think we see.

“Which vertical line is longer?”

Everyone agreed on the same. “This one is longer!” as they pointed to the picture on the right. They were all surprised when they found out that they are in fact, the same length! They could not believe it and stared at the picture for a while comparing the two lines.

”How many legs does this elephant have?”

“Four!” they said right away, but once they started counting, they were confused.

”Five?”

”No, I see six!”

This boy was baffled and was counting and recounting as he got different answers each time.

We looked at various other pictures to test our eyes. Everyone started gathering around this one as they all tried hard to “see” the 3D butterfly. The students were also particularly surprised by another optical illusion where the circles seemed to be spinning. The students even touched the paper to check!

We also looked at the Penrose triangle which is an example of an “impossible shape”. It is an optical illusion which can be depicted on paper as a drawing, but not as a solid object. The students had a go at drawing this impossible shape which was a very tricky task.

Looking at optical illusions ignited the students’ curiosity as they tried to figure out how they work. They were so fascinated by how the optical illusions tricked their brains to see things which may or may not be real. Can we really trust our eyes?

Prime Academic Preschool Gotanda