Student Exploration: Uniform Circular Motion
Vocabulary: acceleration, centripetal acceleration, centripetal force, Newton’s first law,
Newton’s second law, uniform circular motion, vector, velocity
Prior Knowledge Qu
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Student Exploration: Uniform Circular Motion
Vocabulary: acceleration, centripetal acceleration, centripetal force, Newton’s first law,
Newton’s second law, uniform circular motion, vector, velocity
Prior Knowledge Questions (Do these BEFORE using the Gizmo.)
1. A boy is whirling a yo-yo above his head in a counterclockwise direction. At the exact moment shown at left, he
lets go of the string. In which direction will the yo-yo travel?
Draw an arrow on the image to show the yo-yo’s direction.
counterclockwise
2. Do you think the released yo-yo’s path will be straight or
curved? Explain. Curved, due to the centripetal force
Gizmo Warm-up
The Uniform Circular Motion Gizmo™ shows a pink puck that is
floating above a circular air table. The puck is held to the center of
the table by a string so that it travels in a circle at a constant speed.
Check that the radius is 8.0 m and the mass is 5.0 kg. Set the
velocity to 5.0 m/s.
1. Turn on Show puck position (m). What are the coordinates of
the puck’s position? (8,0)
2. Click Play ( ), and then click Pause ( ) when the puck is close to the y-axis.
What is the puck’s position now? (0,8)
3. Click Reset ( ). Select the BAR CHART tab and select Velocity from the dropdown
menu. The three bars represent the magnitude, the x component, and the y component of
the puck’s velocity.
A. Click Play. Does the magnitude of the velocity change over time? The Magnitude
doesn’t change but the x and y component does.
B. Do the x and y components of the velocity change over time? Yes
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