Projectile Motion

Related Physics Education Research

See Arnold Arons A Guide to Introductory Physics Teaching and Student preconceptions about vector knematics by J. M Aguirre in Physics Teacher 26, 212-216 (1988).

Overview of Worksheet

The students take and analyze projectile motion data from a video. They see that in fact the two motions are independent.

Approximate Time

An hour.

Required Student Background

Students need to be familiar with velocity, acceleration, and vectors.

Connections to the Tutorials

The ideas from Motion in Two Dimensions tutorial can be used to analyze the trajectory of a projectile. Looking at velocity and acceleration vectors and speeding up and slowing down regions is a new way to look at a familiar problem.

Required Equipment

Videopoint software (or equivalent software) that allows students to take data from video images and a movie of projectile motion (several are included with Videopoint softward).

Evaluation of Worksheet

We used the Force Concept Inventory that measures student understanding of basic kinematic and dynamic concepts and which was introduced by I. A. Halloun and D. Hestenes in The initial knowledge state of college physics students in American Journal of Physics 53, 1043 - 1055 (1985).

To take into account previous knowledge, the FCI is typically given twice: once before instruction and once after. Scores on the FCI are reported as percent gain: post test - pre test score / perfect score - pre-test score. This measure the fraction of what they could have learn, that they learn.

We used our own class as a control, in that the activities did not work well the Fall 1998 semester, and were reworked for the Fall 1999 semester.

For Fall 1998, our students percent gain was 25% +/- 45% (17 students), for Fall 1999 45% +/- 28% (43 students) the second year. The second year score is in line with national averages for interactive-engagement classes, see R. R. Hake Interactive-engagement versus traditional methods: A six-thousand-student survey of mechanics test data for introductory physics courses in American Journal of Physics 66, 64-74 (1998). We feel these improvements in scores were made possible by improved worksheets.