Week 14 Reflection

This week in physics we focused more on acceleration and an object's tendency to increase in velocity as it is free failing, due to only the Earth acting upon it (unbalanced force). On Monday, we went up to the roof of the school to observe how different objects fell and how long it took them to hit the ground. We dropped a bowling ball and a lacrosse ball at the exact time and it resulted in both balls hitting the grass at the same time. This is because the Earth was acting on both objects with the same gravitational pull despite their different weights. It was fun to get a fresh eye and witness physics in action outside of the classroom and the lab also demonstrated principals I had never though of before. For example, I would have thought that the bowling ball would have hit the ground first.

On Tuesday, we had our first assessment for the acceleration unit and I though it went really well for me. I understood that an object's velocity would continue to increase as it fell and I was able to use the quadratic equation accurately to calculate the final position and other missing pieces. I liked the fact that we were able to go over the questions on the assessment while having our paper in front of us to see where we went wrong and what we need to improve upon. Also, because we were grading our own, I was able to talk to my teacher and reach a better understanding than my words reflected on my assessment. This was helpful because I could show that I knew the material without having to come in to reassess due to a confusion of words on my paper.

At the end of the week, we began looking at velocity and acceleration arrows. We came to the conclusion that the closer the dots were to each other, the slower the object was traveling. And vice versa, the farther apart the dots were, the faster the velocity. The length demonstrates how fast the object was moving, while the arrow indicates the direction of the motion. Acceleration arrows tell how much and in which direction the velocity changes between the velocity arrows. There was also a demonstration in class of a line of girls traveling at both constant and unconstant velocities to come to a concensus about what the velocity arrows really represented.

And now off to my mouse-trap car!