Module 4: Constant Acceleration

Recommended completion date: June 25th

SECTION 1: LEARN

Welcome to the Acceleration module, where you will investigate how gravity affects the movement of objects. Our focus with this module is to help you consider how data collected on a falling object can help you integrate science, data analysis, and modeling into your own classroom using digital resources and platforms. We will examine student work, explore the behavior of a falling ball and a rolling wheel, and then use Desmos and CODAP as tools to model and analyze data. We will also be utilizing Flipgrid and Padlet to share ideas with each other.

INTRODUCTION TO SCIENCE CONTEXT

Video 1: Stop-motion animation - Baby Snake

To frame our inquiry, watch this short stop-motion animation that replicates the motion of snakes (and, uh, worms).

Video 2: Introduction to Acceleration

How would we make a stop-motion for a falling ball? What do students expect to see for a falling object's position over time?

Data Visualization 1

Create your own illustration

How would you illustrate the ball's position over time? Print THIS DOCUMENT and then sketch your own response. If you cannot print the document, just create a sketch on your own graph paper or lined paper. Then upload a photo or PDF of your illustration using THIS GOOGLE FORM. What assumptions did you make about the impact of gravity as the ball falls? How might you estimate the speed of the ball at each position you marked as it fell?

Analyze and sort student work

Now take a few minutes to examine these student data files and sort them into groups that make sense to you. Pay attention to similarities and differences between students' conceptions of what the ball might do as it falls. What might students have been thinking about the impact of gravity as they generated their responses and how do your conjectures about their thinking influence your sort?

Mini-Lecture

Now watch this 8 and a half minute video that discusses two students' data displays. As you watch, think about the different conceptions the students might have about the impact of gravity on the speed of the ball.

Click the button below to access the video. You do not need to make an EdPuzzle account.

Watch this video in EdPuzzle

Acceleration in Action

Now watch gravity in action as a wheel rolls down an inclined ramp. What do you notice about the wheel's position and speed? (If you're interested, and wish to build your own, instructions to do so are available HERE.)

Creating a Data Display

Collecting data as the wheel rolls down the ramp can be challenging. Watch as Leslie explains her method for creating the blue tape data display below.

Data Display

IMG_1994.HEIC

Get Data: Blue Tape Rolling Wheel Data

What Do You Notice?

What do you notice about the blue tape data display?
If you were to map this display onto the Cartesian coordinate plane, what would the axes represent? What would the unit of measure be for each?
What does the length of each piece of blue tape tell you about the wheel and its motion?
What does this data display reveal about the speed of the wheel?
What does this data display reveal about the acceleration of the wheel and the way in which its speed is changing?
Make a conjecture about how this display connects to the student illustrations and the ways students think about how gravity works.

Share your thoughts on the Padlet corresponding to your grade level workshop (linked below).

Share your thoughts on Padlet:

Grade 6

Grade 7

Grades 8 & 9

Grades 10+

Revisit the Dropping Ball

Collecting Your Own Data

The points at left were created from a slow-motion video and a tracking app. If you wish to collect your own data for moving objects using your phone, apps that will allow you to do so are:

For iOS: https://www.vernier.com/product/video-physics-for-ios/

For tech savvy: https://physlets.org/tracker/

Get Data: Falling Ball Data

PART A

Investigate Impact and Properties of Gravity

Spend an hour or two working with the following two methods as you investigate the impact of gravity on moving objects.

Method 1: Use CODAP to Analyze the Effects of Gravity

Access and download the Blue Tape Rolling Wheel Data.csv and the Falling Ball Data.csv files. Upload the data sets to separate CODAP pages and explore the distributions of each column of data and the associations between variables (Data Guide). Think about how you might represent the posed questions in terms of the variables found in the headers of the data set columns, and then answer the following:

Which variables matter? Why?
Do falling objects speed up by adding one unit of speed for every additional second it falls, or
Do falling objects speed up by adding one unit of speed for every unit of distance fallen, or
Do falling objects speed up in a different way?
What type of graphical association might you expect to see between variables for the the two featured student conceptions in Leslie's video above?
The title of this module is "Constant Acceleration." Which column(s) of data might help you estimate this constant? How? Why?

Method 2: Use DESMOS to Analyze the Effects of Gravity

Open the Google Sheet versions of the Blue Tape Rolling Wheel Data and the Falling Ball Data. Cut and paste the data into Desmos [how-to-video] and then use the regression [how-to-video], distribution [how-to-video], and/or summary statistics [how-to-video] feature of Desmos to further explore associations between variables and variation within variables. Investigate the answers to the following questions:

Which variables matter? Why?
Do falling objects speed up by adding one unit of speed for every additional second it falls, or
Do falling objects speed up by adding one unit of speed for every unit of distance fallen, or
Do falling objects speed up in a different way?
This youtube video can help you differentiate between three different types of growth. Which functions appear to model the different graphical relationships you notice in the data? Which functions best model the student conceptions featured in Leslie's Mini Lecture?
What type of graphical association might you expect to see between variables for the the two featured student conceptions in Leslie's Mini Lecture above?
The title of this module is "Constant Acceleration." Where can you see this constant in the graphs you generate using Desmos? Where does it appear in the function models you choose to use during your regression analyses?

Share your Findings

When you feel you have an evidence-based claim related to the questions posed in Part A, make a slideshow presentation for one claim about how gravity works and provide supporting evidence (include images, words, statistics, graphs) to support your claim. Use Flipgrid's screen recording feature to record your video [how-to video].

Comment on other participants' video presentations in Flipgrid.