Name: ______________________________________ Date: ________________________
Student Exploration: Fan Cart Physics
Vocabulary: acceleration, force, friction, mass, newton, Newton’s second law
Prior Knowledge Questions (Do these BEFORE using the Gizmo.)
1. Imagine a horse pulling a cart. What would happen to the speed of the cart if several bags of
cement were added to the cart? _______________________________________________
2. Suppose several more horses were hitched up to the same cart. How would this affect the
speed of the cart? __________________________________________________________
Although these questions may seem simple, they form the basis of Newton’s second law of
motion. The Fan Cart Physics Gizmo™ can be used to illustrate all three of Newton’s laws.
Gizmo Warm-up
The Fan Cart Physics Gizmo™ shows a common
teaching tool called a fan cart. Place fan A on the cart
and turn it on by clicking the ON/OFF button below.
1. Look at the blue lines coming from the fan. In which
direction is the air pushed? ____________________
2. Press Play ( ) and observe the cart. In which
direction does the cart move? __________________
By blowing to the left, the fans exert a force on the cart
that pushes it to the right. This illustrates
Newton’s third law: A force in one direction results
in an equal force in the opposite direction.
3. The velocity (v) of the cart is its speed and direction. Click Reset ( ). Select the BAR
CHART tab, and click Play. Does the velocity change or stay the same? _______________
A change in velocity is called acceleration (a).
Activity B:
Newton’s second
law
Get the Gizmo ready:
Click Reset.
Set the Initial velocity of cart to 0.0 m/s.
Place three fans on the cart, all blowing to the left.
Question: How do mass and force affect acceleration?
1. Experiment : Turn on the fans. Click Play and watch the cart, then select the TABLE tab.
A. Scroll to the bottom of the table. What is the final velocity of the cart? ____________
B. How long did it take the cart to reach the end of the track? _____________________
2. Calculate : Acceleration is a measure of how much the velocity of the cart changes each
second. To calculate acceleration, divide the final velocity by the amount of time it took to
reach that velocity. The units of acceleration are meters per second per second, or m/s2.
A. What is the acceleration of the cart? (Include units.) __________________________
B. Check your answer on the TABLE tab. Were you correct? _____________________
