Speed and Velocity - 1/21/18



Summary: Speed is a scalar quantity that refers to "how fast an object is moving." Speed can be thought of as the rate at which an object covers distance. Velocity is a vector quantity that refers to "the rate at which an object changes its position." To find speed, you take the distance traveled and divide the time. This is also known as rise over run. You can model speed with a graph. The y-axis represents the distance from the initial point. The x-axis represents the time. The steeper the slope of the line, the faster the object is traveling. When the slope is traveling in the positive direction, the object is moving toward its final point. When the slope is in the negative direction, the object is moving back to its starting point.

S&EP - Conducting Investigations: During the matchbox lab I designed and performed an experiment to test my hypotheses. I hypothesisized that the green car would have the highest average speed because when I got to look at the three cars the green car felt the heaviest so gravity would bring it down the track the fastest. Before beginning our matchbox experiment I classified my controlled variables, which were the height of the ramp, the length of the track and the materials used to build the track. The manipulated variable was the car since they were being switched out after three test runs each. The responding variable was the speed at which each car was going at. The experiment proved my hypothesis to be true, the green car had the fastest average speed.

XCC - Structure and Function: The function of a speed graph is in its name, it shows the speed of an object. The structure of a speed graph affects its function because usually the y-axis is distance and the x-axis is time and if this wasn't true the enitre graph would be different than it is. This is because speed is distance over time, aka the y-axis over the x-axis. This means if time and distance switched places on a speed graph it would be incorrect or at least hard to understand. This is also important because the structure of a graph is set up so that the steeper a slope the faster an object is going.





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