Week 4: Swings

 

1. The big question addressed in lab, and a description of what you did.

We did a color wheel activity with mixing different colors of water. Then we made a pendulum with pencils, washers, tape, and string. This helped us conduct an investigation of different variables and how they affected the pendulum. We first tried weight and added washers, but found that the weight didn't affect the time of the period. Then my partner and I tried shortening or adding length to the string. This did affect the time of the period and we started to make graphs of how this was affected. 

1. A description of what you learned in Thursday's lecture.

We talked about air drag in the lecture and how it is seen on swings. We also discussed what affects the period of a swing. This was the rider weight, length of rope, initial release height of swing, wind, and type of rope of chain. Newton's First Law was clarified, and we saw an example of how an object will maintain speed and direction unless acted upon by an unbalanced force in a video about air hockey. Newton's Second Law is simplified down to F=ma. It shows us that larger masses are harder to accelerate. 

1. Answer questions about the weekly textbook reading:
   1. What did you learn? The difference in potential and kinetic energy was clarified. 
   2. What was most helpful? The wrecking ball example was the most helpful for me and the multiple choice check was a good way to check if I understood the real life example. 
   3. What do you need more information on? I would like more information on how a pendulum relates to a swing. When we talked in lecture I could see some relation, but when it comes to children pushing themselves how does that work?
   4. What questions/concerns/comments do you have? Same thing as the question above, how does it work when kids kick on the swing and pump their legs to go faster?