Ist Quarter Eval.

Yay! The first quarter is (almost) over! Physics has gotten a lot better...I don't feel so overwhelmed anymore. I had a lot of fun doing the bullseye labs, even though me and Ryan missed every single one! Class was also very entertaining when Mr. Kohara, um, ate it when he was pushing the stool :) Making the projectile movie was also cool because it made me think about the physics in every day life. I thought the first few chapters, with velocity and acceleration graphs, were the hardest. The graphs just really confused me. I did like the last chapter on Newton's Laws though, because it was the one that made the most sense. I think I'm actually getting a little better at doing physics problems and drawing graphs. I hope I continue to improve in the 2nd Quarter! Anyway, overall, the first quarter was really fun :)

Crabbing involves tension and force. I went crabbing in Oregon last summer, and it was really fun! First, you drop your net basket off the side of the boat and let it sink to the bottom. After a period of time, you haul on the net basket rope to bring it back up. Because you pull at an angle, the force has both a vertical and horizontal vector. Tension is also involved because the rope must be kept taut, otherwise the crabs will be able to fall out of the basket. Since the rope touches the side of the boat as you haul up the crabs, there is friction involved too. I had to apply a lot of force to haul up my basket...I never knew crabs could be so heavy :)

My cousin, Sugar, thought it would be fun to hang onto Uncle Chris's foot and have him drag her around. This is an example of friction. Each time my uncle took a step, his force forward had to overcome the static friction between Sugar and the ground in order for him (or Sugar) to move anywhere. When he succeeded in dragging her, that meant he overcame the maximum static friction. Because Sugar is pretty light, it took less force for my uncle to overcome the maximum static friction than it would have if she was twenty pounds heavier. As Sugar was dragged across the ground, kinetic friction was involved since she was no longer at rest.