What is a Photon? - Sixty Symbols?

A photon is like a tiny, super-fast message carrier that travels through space.

Imagine you're playing with your favorite flashlight in the dark. When you turn it on, light comes out, and that’s because your flashlight is sending out photons, which are like little bits of light traveling one after another.

Photons are not like balls or blocks, they’re more like invisible tiny waves. They can zoom through space really fast, just like how sound travels from a loudspeaker to your ears.

Sometimes, when you shine a flashlight on a wall, the wall glows, that’s because the photons from the light hit the wall and bounce back into your eyes. It's like throwing tiny balls at a wall and catching them again!

Photons can also act like they’re both a wave and a particle, it’s like having a jellybean that sometimes behaves like a bean and other times like a wiggly blob.

So next time you turn on a light, remember: you're sending out photons, little message carriers helping you see the world!