During the Second World War, British residents had to cover their windows and doors at night with heavy blackout material in order to cover any glimmer of light coming from their houses as enemies could spot and target this in an attack.

During our Science sessions, our Year 6’s have investigated which materials would be most effective during a blackout. We began by writing a hypothesis, listing the equipment needed and finally explaining the method.

We tested materials such as black felt, black sugar paper, cardboard and curtains to see which would be the most effective.

By using the data loggers, we recorded the results of how much light passed through the material and learnt that the most opaque material would be the most suitable. To ensure this was a fair test, we calculated the mean of 3 results per material and drew conclusions from this.

We discovered that black felt would be the most effective material to use during a blackout!