Application of Laws
Hook
YouTube video: Geosynchronous satellite orbits. Uniform circular motion is covered in dynamics even though orbits are not covered until a later unit. The same principle applies. Geosynchronous orbits are critical in many everyday applications. When a satellite cable dish is installed, the mechanic points it towards a specific location in the sky. It is the same for all satellite cable dishes within a regional area. This is because the cable satellite orbits the earth at exactly the same speed that the Earth rotates at. This ensures that the satellite is always in the same position in our sky relative to us. GPS uses a systematic network of geosynchronous satellites to determine the location on Earth, much like triangulation a minimum of three satellites are needed. |
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Pedagogical Approach
Interactive Website: Three Laws of Motion This will be a good review and consolidate the laws of motion before moving on to labs and other activities where the laws are applied. This website provided a summary of each law and students can take a quiz at the end. They can print out their results and turn these in allowing for assessment. Activity: Forces Assignment This assignment deals with free body diagrams and applications of these laws. This assignment should be assigned at the end of the previous lesson. This way the students will have the knowledge to work through it as different applications and approaches are done in class. Activity: Circus Physics This activity provides a visualization of the laws of motion in action. The weblink provides a description of how to incorporate the video into instruction and what questions would be appropriate for the students before and after watching the video. Using jigsaw to deconstruct the video would be a great way to allow the students to do the teaching through cooperative learning. |
Laboratory: Hooke's Law This laboratory introduces several applications of Hooke’s law and then goes through an investigation of the k-value and how a system of springs in parallel and in series behaves and what it’s k-value is and how it compares to the individual k-values. |
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. |
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. |
Laboratory: Uniform Circular Motion This laboratory has students analyze the effect mass and radius has on the centripetal acceleration, and as a result, the force. Students are expected to graph each separate trial by hand and determine the relation between each parameter to the force. Once you feel confident that students are proficient in graphing, you can have them construct graphs using software. The use of software will dramatically decrease the time calculation take and will allow you to explore deeper analysis of material with students. |
Laboratory: Pendulum Motion
This laboratory analyzed the effect that mass, radius and initial angle has on the period. Students are to gather data during the first period on various setups analyzing how each parameter affects the period, while keeping the others constant. During the second period, students are to use the provided excel file to graph and analyze their information. They will be able then to derive the formula for the period of pendulum motion. Once they have derived the equation, students can determine the theoretical period. further extension question would be to analyze the error between the experimental period and the theoretical one. They should be able to note that the greater the initial angle is, the further the experimental deviates from the theoretical. At this time you can mention that this formula is for small angles only. A grading scheme is provided for them at the far right hand side. Consolidation
You can use an exit slip or go through the solutions of activities and labs as well, to ensure understanding and clear out any misunderstandings. Here es an example of an exit slip question Exit Slip: Explain in your own words the three laws of motion. |
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. |