Last week, our students explored the concept of potential energy by studying springs and weights with our STEM teachers, Veeshan and Tiffani.
Our students observed that a spring, when stretched, wants to pull itself back into shape. The class then determined that the strength of this “restoring force” is determined by the stiffness of the spring (“k”) and how far it is stretched (“x”). The stiffer the spring and the farther we stretch it, the stronger the restoring force. This observation led us to a formula for calculating the restoring force of the spring: F(spring)=kx.
Next, we wanted to figure out a way to measure the stiffness of our springs. The students hung weights from their springs and measured the distance the springs stretched. The weight divided by the distance the springs stretched gave us our k values.
The students were able to get more accurate values by performing this calculation with various weights and taking the average.
This lesson was a more in-depth look at the spring model of solid objects, which has a direct application to golf. When a golfer hits a ball, the ball deforms a small amount and pushes back on the club. In addition, the lesson gave the students a new way of thinking about the conservation of energy, a very pertinent law to the game of golf!
And all of this work was necessary so the students could move on to measuring the potential energy stored in the spring. That experiment will be part of this week’s study.