Blogpost #7

Remember my roommate, Kanoe, from last week's blogpost? Well she decided to be such a great person and be in this week's picture as well. She randomly decided that she was going to throw an orange up and down and walk across the room for no apparent reason. Every time she tossed the orange up, she was able to catch it even though she was walking. She was able to do this because in the section we're dealing with now, 2-D Kinematics, an important rule is that axes are independent. So, what happens on the x axis stays on the x, and what happens on the y axis stays on the y. Kanoe's horizontal (x) path was constant, while the orange was going fast, slow, stop, slow, fast in the air (y). Therefore, Kanoe was able to continually catch the orange because of the aforementioned rule that axes are independent.

Blogpost #6

This week's unit has to do with vectors. A vector is a mathematical quantity with both magnitude (size and unit) and direction. This picture depicts me throwing a paper airplane to my roommate, Kanoe. The magnitude of the airplane's path would be about three meters. I'm not exactly sure of the degrees of the exact direction, but I'm guessing that the general direction is north. If Kanoe were to throw the plane back to me, it would not be an equivalent vector. Even though the magnitude would be the same, the airplane would not maintain the same direction, therefore the two vectors (airplane's flight path) would not be equivalent. 

Blogpost #5

Today I had PSAT Team (what a fun way to spend my Sunday, right?). We had one ten minute break, and when I walked outside it was drizzling. However, you can't really see the raindrops depicted in the picture, sorry about that. Anyway, I figured if I knew the initial velocity of a raindrop, I would be able to calculate the distance between the cloud from which it fell and the ground. I could do this using the formula d=1/2at^2+V0t. I could plug in acceleration, which would be 9.8 meters per seconds squared (if I indicated that downwards is the positive direction, and the time it took for it to fall. Then I would be able to determine distance.

Blogpost #4

First of all, I'm really sorry this picture didn't come out very nice. Actually, it's really bad because you have to strain you eyes to see what I'm talking about, but bear with me, please. So I was looking out my dorm room window because I heard this really annoying sound. Turns out some guy had scaled the palm tree outside my window and was chopping down the fronds. This was really weird because I didn't see a ladder or anything. Anyway, I figured it would be possible for me to calculate the velocity of a falling frond just before it hit the ground (if I had the initial velocity). I could use the formula Vf=Vi+at. The man was cutting the fronds down with a machete, so their initial free-fall velocity was probably above 0 m/s (if downwards was indicated as the positive direction). The acceleration would be gravity, or 9.8 m/s2. Then I could time the number of seconds it took the frond to fall. After plugging in the numbers, I would be able to calculate its final velocity. *Note that the in the picture, you can basically just see the pile of palm fronds on the ground. 

Blogpost #3

 This week I decided to discuss velocity. So I couldn't exactly get a picture with a moving car, so let's just pretend this car is moving. Velocity is a measurement of how fast and in which direction an object is moving. When determining velocity, it is important to indicate positive and negative direction. Let's say that moving to the right is positive and the left is negative. Therefore, the first car's velocity would be positive, since it's moving in the previously indicated positive direction, and the second one's would be written with a negative number.