Activity Overview
In this lesson, students explore static and kinetic friction by dragging shoes with different types of soles across a table at a constant pace.
Objectives
- Students will determine what factors affect the friction between two surfaces.
- Students will relate the forces needed to drag different shoes across a table at a constant speed.
- Students will develop an understanding of the forces needed to start the motion of shoes with different soles.
Vocabulary
- acceleration
- force
- kinetic friction
- mass
- Newton’s Laws
- static friction
About the Lesson
This lesson simulates the static and kinetic friction of different shoes being dragged across an inclined plane.
As a result, students will:
- Manipulate values for force in different situations.
- Measure static and kinetic friction data.
- Determine the coefficients of static and kinetic friction.
- Apply Newton’s Laws to solve problems.