The Great Gravity Escape
Posted on July 8th, 2019 by Mary Lord
Students in grades 6 to 8 use water balloons and string to understand how the force of gravity between two objects and the velocity of a spacecraft can balance to form an orbit. They see that when the velocity becomes too great for gravity to hold the spacecraft in orbit, the object escapes the orbit and travels further away from the planet.
Filed under: Class Activities, Grades 6-8, Lesson Plans | Comments Off on The Great Gravity Escape
Tags: aeronautical engineering, Class Activities, forces and motion, Grades 6-8, Gravity, orbit, Physics, spacecraft, teachengineering, velocity, water balloons
Teams of high school students learn about energy and energy transformation, then use their knowledge to design and build a paper model of the most fun and exciting roller coaster they can imagine.
Students in grades 7 to 9 build model roller coasters using pipe insulation and marbles, then analyze them using physics principles, including conversions between kinetic and potential energy and frictional effects. A class competition using various marbles to represent different passenger loads determines the most innovative and successful designs.
