Design and Conduct your own experiment with Projectiles

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Class Period.Projectile.Names ex: 3.Projectile.Justin T.Santa C
Learning Goals
Plan and design a scientific investigation that includes:
a. developing a testable question
b. stating a hypothesis (Ifthenbecause format)
c. identifying the independent(manipulated) and the dependent (responding) variables
d. designing a written procedure for a controlled experiment
e. construct a data table for data collection
f. graph data to demonstrate the relationships
g. keep all other conditions constant!
h. Write a concluding paragraph restating your question, discuss your results in relation to
your hypothesis, and mention any difficulties/errors you made in your experiment.
Directions:
Log onto http://phet.colorado.edu/simulations/sims.php?sim=Projectile_Motion
Press the green RUN NOW button

What factors do you think effect projectile movement?

Velocity, Angle of trajectory, Mass, Initial speed

With a partner, or by yourself, pick one of the above factors (other than velocity) and propose a
question.

Angle of trajectory; How does the angle of trajectory affect the total distance that the
projectile flies?
Write your Hypothesis (Ifthenbecause)
If the angle of trajectory is smaller then the projectile will go farther because of less hang
time.
Explore the Projectile Simulation and determine how to test your question.
To test my question I can set up 5 or 6 data collection sections to accurately test my
hypothesis
Design a data table and collect data (think what is your independent variable, what is you dependent
variable)

Angle

Range

Speed

22

182m

32m/s

30

227m

32m/s

38

250.4m

32m/s

46

256.3m

32m/s

54

249.1m

32m/s

Show the relationship of your data in a graph made with a spreadsheet.

 Refer to learning goal h and write your conclusion

After reviewing my data collection, I have in fact noticed that it does not matter how low the angle
is as long as it does not go above 50 degrees. After passing 50 degrees, the angle of the
projectile ends up decreasing in distance. So to some extent, my data collection was correct, and
to another extent it was not correct.