OBJECTIVE: By the end of today’s lesson, you will be able to…
5th Grade Science Name:___________________________
Unit: Physics Date:____________________________
Speed Lab Homeroom:______________________
SWBAT conduct an investigation to determine how the height of a ramp
affects an object’s speed.
Do Now
1. You want to run to your best friend’s house, which is located 240 m down the
block. You can run at 8 m/s. How long will it take you to get there?
2. Ms. Whitfield and Ms. Watkin are both driving from the school to Dave’s Market. It takes Ms.
Whitfield six minutes to arrive. It takes Ms. Watkin ten minutes. Who was traveling at a faster
speed? How do you know?
______________________________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________________________
Speed Investigation
Investigation Question: How does the mass of a marble affect
its speed?
Hypothesis (1 pt): If we roll a heavy marble and a light marble,
then
_________________________________________________________________
Variables (4 pts):
Independent: __________________________________________________
Dependent: ___________________________________________________
Two Constants: ________________________________________________
Materials:
Marble Stopwatch
Ruler Two Pieces of Tape
Jobs:
Timer: Starts and stops the stopwatch to determine how long
it
takes for the marble to travel one yard
_________________________ ___________________________
Marble Keeper: Applies forces to the marbles at the
beginning of each trial
_________________________
Marble Catcher: Stops the marble after it crosses the finish
line and returns it to the Marble Keeper
_________________________ ___________________________
Procedure:
1. Place your first piece of tape to create a starting line.
2. Place your second piece of tape one yard from the first to create a finish
line.
3. The Marble Keeper places the light marble at the finish line. The Marble
Keeper gently pulls back the end of the ruler and releases it to hit the
marble. It may take a couple of tries to figure out how much force is
necessary to get the marble to the finish line.
4. The Timer starts the stopwatch when the marble is released and stops it
when the marble crosses the finish line.
5. All group members record the marble’s time for trial 1 rounded to the
nearest tenth of a second.
6. Repeat steps 3 through 5 for trials 2 and 3. The Marble Keeper must try to
use the same amount of force each time.
7. Repeat steps 3 through 5 to complete three trials for your heavy marble.
The Marble Keeper should still be using the same amount of force that he
or she used for the light marble.
Data Collection (3pts):
Trial Distance Time
Light Marble Trial 1 1 yard
Light Marble Trial 2 1 yard
Light Marble Trial 3 1 yard
Heavy Marble Trial 1 1 yard
Heavy Marble Trial 2 1 yard
Heavy Marble Trial 3 1 yard
Bar Graph (3 pts):
3.0
2.9
2.8 Trial Number
2.7
2.6
2.4
2.3
2.2
2.1
2
1.9
1.8
1.7
1.6
1.5
1.4
1.3
1.2
1.1
1
LMT 1 LMT 2 LMT 3 HM T 1 HMT 2 HMT 3
Data Analysis:
1. During which trial did your marble move the fastest? How do
you know? (2 pts)
____________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________
2. In general, did the light marble or the heavy marble roll
more quickly? Use evidence from your data table to support
your answer. (2 pts)
_____________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________
3. What forces were acting on your marble during this
investigation? (2 pts)
_____________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________
Conclusion (4 pts):
My hypothesis was __________________________. The data showed
that ______________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
_________________________________________________________________.
This happened because __________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
My new question is
________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
Lab Reflection:
1. I feel that I did my part and worked well with my group
members (2 pts).
1 2 3 4
Strongly Strongly
Disagree Agree
Explain your answer.
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
2. I feel that my group members completed their fair share of the work
(2 pts).
1 2 3 4
Strongly Strongly
Disagree Agree
Explain your answer.
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
1. What did you enjoy about this investigation? (1 pt)
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
2. What would you change about this investigation if you could do
it again? (1 pt)
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
3. Describe at least one thing you learned by completing this lab.
(1 pt)
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
Total Score: ________/ 28 pts