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Motion and Design

Lesson 4: Pulling a Vehicle: Looking at Force

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Activities: 
  1. Discuss unbalanced forces (tug of war).
  2. Have a student move from one end of the room to another. Other students describe the student’s motion and change(s) in motion.
  3. Give each group materials listed on page 42 of the teacher’s guide.
  4. Students turn to pages 15-16 in the student book and follow the directions as a group.
  5. SCIENCE NOTEBOOK: Students will complete 3-A thoroughly and then glue the page into their science notebooks.
  6. SCIENCE NOTEBOOK: After students complete 3-A, students develop their own question to investigate (using the materials provided for lesson). Students write the question in their science notebook. They also record both procedure and data for the experiment for the investigation.
  7. After the lesson, students share findings about force (the greater the force, the greater the change in speed over the same distance”). Discuss questions on page 44 of the teacher’s guide:
    1. When did you observe your vehicle begin to move?
    2. What caused your vehicle to move?
    3. Did the vehicle move differently when you changed the weight? Why do you think this happened?
    4. What made the vehicle stop moving each time?
    5. Why did you use the bookend? Did you need it each time? Why or why not?
      (For each different weight you used, how would you describe the motion of the vehicle?
  8. Students discuss their original investigations and the results of these investigations.
  9. SCIENCE NOTEBOOK: After each group discussion, students complete the LOL in their notebooks. The LOL also includes a content blast.