A Wonderleaf question
How do cell phones work?
a real page from the book
Cell phones work by turning your voice, photo, or message into data, then sending that data as radio waves to a nearby tower. From there, computers route it through the network to another tower, and the receiving phone changes it back into sound, pictures, or words.
The clever trick is that each tower looks after a small area, so your phone can move from one area to the next during a call. A greeting crosses the system in tiny digital pieces, fast enough that the trip feels almost instant.
Wonder words
- antenna
- signal
- network
- packets
Try it out
Call someone in another room, say one word, and trace aloud the path from phone to tower to phone.
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