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Re: free fall data



John's approach to data, least square fitting, is OK if the goal is to
find "the best g" from positional data (without calculating individual
v and a). But my goal is to "discover" that acceleration remains constant.
In that situation the step-wise approach is unavoidable. Ideally, the
final result should be a horizontal a=f(t) line for all intervals.

The students could use a standard curve fitting position time data
starting with linear (paying attention to MSE) moving to quadratic. If
a couple events are analyzed this way then it will become apparent that
the squared term (t) coefficient is almost the same for any event (while
the other two coefficients clearly depend on initial position and speed.

Could the students catch this? The "leap" is that this value for g is
half the size of that coefficient or is it a "skip"?

The idea of students discovering this constant is appealing.

Tim







--

Timothy C. Burgess, Ph.D.
Science Department Head
UMS-Wright Preparatory School
65 N. Mobile St.
Mobile, AL 36607
(334)-479-6551 Ext. 152