Video Demo: Newton's 3rd Law
A simple demonstration of Newton's 3rd law of motion in action. A rubber band under tension is cut, launching both the sled and the launching mechanism in equal and opposite directions.
I made ScienceFix.com to share my favorite demos that I do in my middle school science classes.
A simple demonstration of Newton's 3rd law of motion in action. A rubber band under tension is cut, launching both the sled and the launching mechanism in equal and opposite directions.
This is a fun and easy demo to teach what happens to objects when forces are acting in the same direction. A series of balls are dropped together, one on top of another. The forces are added together, creating a larger force that propels the top ball to a much greater height.
Inertia is the tendency of an object to resist a change in its motion. An apple and a knife are moving downward. The counter-top applies an unbalanced force upward on the knife. The knife decelerates, but the apple does not. The apple decelerates only when the knife handle applies a force upward on it.
According to Newton's first law of motion, an object moving at constant velocity will continue to move at constant velocity unless an outside unbalanced force is applied. This is why moving objects on Earth will always slow down and stop. The outside unbalanced force that does it is friction. Watch the video to see how friction affects the motion of a marble on a track.
Speed is the rate at which an object covers a distance. How do you know if that rate changes or not? The video shows how to determine if the speed of an object is constant.