Unit 2 Reflection

Physics for me got exponentially harder during this unit.  It seemed like the more we studied the more complicated the material became, mostly in terms of mathematics, but also conceptually.  The concepts seemed blatantly obvious at first, but there turned out to be deep complicated explanations behind everything.  The first concept we studied was Newton's Second Law of Motion, which states that an object's acceleration is directly proportional to its Net Force, and inversely proportional to its mass.  In equation form, a=Fnet/m.  This concept actually got easier for me over the course of this unit.  I began to relate everything back to this easy to remember formula.  We then studied the physics of throwing objects straight up, dropping them, and also free fall.  We had to call upon the old formula, d=1/2gt^2 quite often while studying these concepts.  We learned that while an object is in free fall, its acceleration equals 10 m/s^2 (9.8 m/s^2 for lab purposes).  This was a fairly easy concept to understand.  We often had to use the formula v=at to find the instantaneous velocity.  Throwing an object straight up became alot easier to understand when Mrs. Lawrence showed us how to draw and label a picture to go with the question.  Now, I am efficient with solving those problems accurately.  Projectiles were very tricky to me.  I found it difficult to relate them to throwing objects straight up.  When we carried out the "Hit the Bull's Eye" lab, my partner and I ran into many speed bumps.  In the end we realized that with alot of work, it is possible to render an estimate of where the projectile will land that is very close to the target.  My partner and I won the contest, and it did help me understand the concept.  Finally, our class looked at air resistance.  I found this interesting because our studies of Unit 2 would finally be relating to the real world.  I found this concept to be easier than projectiles, but not as easy as Newton's Second Law.  The podcast about cats really helped me to understand this topic too.  I realized that when an object has reached terminal velocity, the impact with the ground will not be as violent as one accelerating to the point of contact, which is why cats that fell from the 5th floor were more harmed than those that fell from the 10th floor.