Think it through together · A little story
A girl sends a drawing to a friend far away. The robot draws several forwarding stops on a map. None of the stops needs to understand the little cat in the picture.
Lay out the process
- SenderPrepares the data
- First hopSends it into the provider’s network
- Networks along the wayForward it hop by hop
- ReceiverPasses it to the right program
The internet carries data across multiple links and routing devices.
At each hop, a packet is passed toward the next stop. The medium might change from cable to fiber or radio. What travels is data, not the drawing itself moving through a wire.
Protocols and applications at the receiving end turn the received data into information that can be used.
Your turn to try
If data passes through three routers, does that mean the photo was printed three times?
Have you thought it through? Open for an explanation
No. The routers handle receiving and forwarding data; they do not turn the image into paper.
Take away one discovery
The internet carries data across multiple links and routing devices.
Try covering the diagram above and explaining each step to someone in your family. If one step is hard to explain, go back and look at that card again.