2-24-09

Today, on February 24th Mr. Manning's Physics Class did some pretty crazy stuff. Mr. Manning was actually in some sort of engineering competition with his students and was absent from class. Although Mr. Manning was not there the class persevered and did stuff. The class was asked to work on the Energy and Roller Coaster Worksheet. When doing this worksheet, the work- energy theorem is very important to understand. When an object speeds up, its gain in kinetic energy comes from the work done on it. Also, when an object slows, work is done (negative work) to reduce the kinetic energy. Therefore, work equals change in kinetic energy. On the worksheet, the questions asked you determine things such as the amount of energy lost between points on the roller coaster, and the velocities of the roller coaster's cart at certain positions. The velocity at a certain positions can be found by first finding the kinetic energy and then solving for the variable v (velocity). In some problems it was given that 2000 joules of energy were lost between each point. You then had to subtract 2000 joules from the total energy of every subsequent point. Lastly, a good thing to remember is how to differentiate between potential and kinetic energies. True potential energy is when an object is stationary. Kinetic energy, being the energy of motion, is when an object is moving.

This worksheet is due on Friday, February 27th. The unit 7 reading guide and test is on Monday February 29th.

Roller coasters are ridiculous!