Physics Fun

 

In early November, Upper School physics students participated in a bowling ball grand prix, a fun, tactile introduction to a unit on Newton’s first and third laws of motion. Students maneuvered through a series of gates, having to change directions and keep the bowling ball under control. The far side of the course included a circular path they had to navigate, providing a great introduction to centripetal forces in a later unit. The “no touch zone” helped to introduce the idea of inertia (objects continuing in their state of motion when net forces are not acting on them). This activity gave the students’ brains a hook on which to hang their newly learned knowledge.