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Grade Range:
Description:
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Circle of Knowledge
Lesson Plan
Physical Science
8
90+ Minutes
Katlyn Allmon

Instructional Unit Content

Standard(s)/Element(s)
Content Area Standard
S8P3. Students will investigate relationship between force, mass, and the motion of objects.
a. Determine the relationship between velocity and acceleration.
b. Demonstrate the effect of balanced and unbalanced forces on an object in terms of gravity,
inertia, and friction.
TAG Standard
Higher Order and Critical Thinking Skills

2. The student responds to questions with supporting information that reflects in-depth
knowledge of a topic.
7. The student examines an issue from more than one point of view.
8. The student separates ones own point of view from that of others.
Summary/Overview
The focus of this lesson is to allow students to discern the relationship between velocity and
acceleration in regards to force, mass and motion within a variety of real world situations.

Enduring Understanding(s)
At the end of this lesson the student will understand that
a) Velocity and acceleration depend upon the mass, force and motion of the object.
b) Gravity is a force that impacts the acceleration of an object in free fall.
c) Friction is a force resisting the motion of an object.
Essential Question(s)
How do force, mass and motion impact the velocity and acceleration of an object in everyday
life?
Concept(s) to Maintain
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All matter in motion has mass and takes up space.

Velocity is the distance traveled over time with a direction.
Acceleration refers to changing direction, increasing or decreasing speed.
Evidence of Learning
What students should know:
a. The shape of an object can influence the amount of friction the object experiences.
b. An object with more mass will need more force to accelerate it.
c. Acceleration and velocity will increase when more force is present.
d. The greater the mass of an object the more gravitational force it will possess.
What students should be able to do:
a. Respond to questions with supporting information that reflects in-depth knowledge of
a topic.
b. Examine an issue from more than one point of view.
c. Separates ones own point of view from that of others.
Suggested Vocabulary
Velocity
Acceleration
Speed
Gravity
Friction
Procedure(s)
Phase 1: Sparking the Discussion (Hook)
1.

Call for volunteers to answer the following questions Have you ever thrown a paper airplane
that didnt cover much distance? A paper airplane that flew very successfully? Pose the question:
What factors were impacted the motion of the paper airplane? How do these factors impact the
motion of all objects? Allow students to record their ideas. Select a few students to respond
aloud.

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Phase 2: Acquiring Content Needed to Participate in Discussion

2.

3.

Pose the essential (focus) question: How do force, mass and motion impact the velocity
and acceleration of an object in everyday life? Activate prior knowledge by having students
create sentences using at least three words from the Word Splash.
Students will review formulas, read Fearless Felix Breaks The Sound Barrier, What is
Orbit? and Solar-Powered Plane Completes Historic 'Across America' Flight and take notes on
the Factors of Motion organizer.

Phase 3: Kindling the Discussion

4.

Students will arrange in groups of three (one student from each article reading), use their
notes from the article readings and the Questioning Cube to answer and have small group
discussions.

5.

As a whole group, students will then discuss their findings about acceleration and
velocity in regards to motion, mass and force.

Phase 4: Synthesis Activity

6.

Students will sort the objects provided into categories of most acceleration and velocity and least
acceleration and velocity. Pose the question: What is necessary for a change in acceleration or
velocity of an object in motion? Students might find ideas for their solution at
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WXN7e1hfDAE and https://www.youtube.com/watch?
v=2SW_3fiqntM .

Summarizing Activity

3-2-1 Exit Ticket

Resource(s)
Anchor Text(s):
Fearless Felix Breaks The Sound Barrier! Dogo News Article by Meera Dolasia
http://www.dogonews.com/2012/10/15/fearless-felix-breaks-the-sound-barrier
What is Orbit? NASA Article Courtesy of NASA's Human Exploration and Development
of Space Enterprise Published by NASAexplores
http://www.nasa.gov/audience/forstudents/5-8/features/orbit_feature_5-8.html
Solar-Powered Plane Completes Historic 'Across America' Flight Dogo News Article by
Meera Dolasia
http://www.dogonews.com/2013/7/9/solar-powered-plane-completes-historic-across-americaflight
Technology:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WXN7e1hfDAE https://www.youtube.com/watch?
v=2SW_3fiqntM

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Handouts:
Handout 1:
Handout 2:
Handout 3:
Handout 4:
Handout 5:
Handout 6:
Handout 7:
Handout 8:

Word Splash
Fearless Felix Breaks The Sound Barrier! Article
What is Orbit? Article
Solar-Powered Plane Completes Historic 'Across America' Flight Article
Notes Organizer
Questioning Cubes
Acceleration and Velocity Image Sort
3-2-1

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Handout 1
Word Splash

Motion

Force

Inertia

Mass

Factors Impacting an
Object in Motion
Friction

Gravity

Velocity

Acceleration

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Handout 2
'Fearless Felix' Breaks The Sound Barrier!
By Meera Dolasia on October 15, 2012

On Sunday, October 14th, over eight million people tuned in to YouTube to watch Felix
Baumgartner as he attempted his historic leap from the edge of Space - And they were not
disappointed. Not only did the 43-year old daredevil complete the jump as planned, at the
end of the epic event, he simply got up and walked over to greet his cheering fans.
The exciting event began to unfold at about 11.30 am EST when Felix's 550-foot tall
helium balloon, took off from New Mexico. The audience watched breathlessly as it
turned into a tiny speck before completely disappearing into the blue skies. The skydiver
encountered his first hurdle when he got to 62,000 feet, an area scientists often refer to as
the Armstrong limit. This is where the atmospheric pressure is so low that if not protected
adequately, human blood starts to boil. While Felix was fine, his faceplate visor, designed
to make sure he had full vision at all times, began to fog up.

However, there was not much that could be done, especially given that the helium
balloon kept rising higher and higher and then at 2.08 EST, 128,000 feet above the
ground came the moment everybody had been waiting for. Felix opened the door of his
capsule and prepared to jump out! Given the amount of things that could still go wrong
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and the fact that his visor was a little fogged up, we cannot even begin to guess his
mindset at that particular moment.

But as promised, after uttering the words 'I am coming home', the fearless man jumped
off and for a few heart-stopping moments disappeared from sight. According to Felix,
while the exit was perfect, it was extremely difficult to control his body from spinning
out of control because he was hurtling down so rapidly. He knew that he had to do
something to stabilize himself quickly or risk losing consciousness, which would have
been fatal. While he managed to do it, he says it was much harder than he had thought it
would be and at times, extremely terrifying. In fact, so occupied was he that he didn't
even know that he had broken the sound barrier until he was on the ground.

But thankfully, all went well and after 4 minutes 20 seconds of free-falling, Felix reached
his parachute opening altitude of 5,000 feet and then gracefully glided down to his
designated landing spot about 40 miles east of Roswell.
Upon completing the epic jump, Felix broke the record for the first man to free fall
through the sound barrier, the highest manned flight and the man to jump from the
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highest altitude. The one record he did not break however, was the longest free fall. That
still belongs to Joe Kittinger, who also leaped from Space, albeit from a lower altitude in
1960. But Felix is not disappointed - Three out of four is not bad especially given the fact
that Kittinger is his mentor and was the person reassuring him as he made the leap down!

As for what you can expect from Baumgartner next? Not much because he apparently is
retiring and now plans to do much tamer things like fly helicopters on mountain rescue
and firefighting missions in the U.S. and Austria. We for one have to see that to believe
it!

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Handout 3
What is orbit?
09.10.03
Courtesy of NASA's Human Exploration and Development of Space Enterprise
Published by NASAexplores: October 25, 2001

Diagram of the planets and other heavenly bodies.

Orbit is a word we hear quite often. Every time the Space Shuttle lifts off the launch pad,
we hear it. Every time the Space Shuttle meets up with the International Space Station
(ISS), we hear it. And every time a rocket launches a payload, we hear the word "orbit."
It's a widely used term, but do you know what an orbit really is?
An orbit is a regular, repeating path that one object in space takes around another one. An
object in an orbit is called a satellite. A satellite can be natural, like the Earth or the
Moon. It can also be man-made, like the Space Shuttle or the ISS.
In our solar system, the Earth and the eight other planets orbit the Sun. Most of the
objects orbiting the Sun move along or close to an imaginary flat surface. This imaginary
surface is called the ecliptic plane. Many planets also have moons. These moons orbit
around them.
Orbits are elliptical in shape, this means they are similar to an oval. For the planets, the
orbits are almost round. The orbits of comets have a different shape. They are highly
eccentric or "squashed." Satellites that orbit the Earth are not always the same distance
from the Earth. Sometimes they are closer, and at other times they are farther away. The
closest point a satellite comes to the Earth is called its perigee. The farthest point is the
apogee. The time it takes a satellite to make one full orbit is called its period. The
inclination is the angle the orbital plane makes when compared with the Earth's equator.
The space station Skylab orbiting the Earth.
An object in motion will stay in motion unless something pushes or pulls on it. This is
Isaac Newton's First Law of Motion. Without gravity, an Earth-orbiting satellite would go
off into space along a straight line. With gravity, it is pulled back toward the Earth. There
is a constant tug-of-war between the satellites tendency to move in a straight line, or
momentum, and the tug of gravity pulling it back.

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An object's momentum and the force of gravity have to be balanced for an orbit to
happen. If the forward momentum of one object is too great, it will speed past the other
one and not enter into orbit. If momentum is too small, the object will be pulled into the
other one and crash. When these forces are balanced, the object is always falling into the
planet, but because it's moving sideways fast enough, it never hits the planet.
Escape velocity is the speed an object must go to break free from a planet's gravity and
enter into orbit. Escape velocity depends on the mass of the planet. Each planet has a
different escape velocity. The object's distance from the planet's center is also important.
The escape velocity from the Earth is about 11.3 kilometers (7 miles) per second.
Orbital velocity is the speed needed to stay in orbit. At an altitude of 242 kilometers (150
miles), this is about 17,000 miles per hour. This is just a little less than full escape
velocity.
The Space Shuttle in
Low-Earth Orbit.
Low-Earth Orbit (LEO) is restricted to the first 100 to 200 miles of space. LEO is the
easiest orbit to get to and stay in. This is where the Shuttle and ISS conduct their
operations. One complete orbit in LEO takes about 90 minutes.
Satellites that seem to be attached to some location on Earth are in Geosynchronous Earth
Orbit (GEO). These satellites orbit about 23,000 miles above the equator and complete
one revolution around the Earth precisely every 24 hours. Satellites headed for GEO first
go to an elliptical orbit with an apogee about 23,000 miles. Firing the rocket engines at
apogee then makes the orbit round. Geosynchronous orbits are also called geostationary.
Any satellite with an orbital path going over or near the poles maintains a polar orbit.
Polar orbits are usually in low-Earth orbit. They remain in place while the Earth passes
under. This means that eventually, the entire Earth's surface passes under a satellite in
polar orbit.
When a meteorite enters our atmosphere and becomes a "shooting star," it is no longer in
an orbit. Some space probes, like Voyager, have reached escape velocity and broken away
from the pull of the Sun's gravity. These probes are leaving the solar system. They are not
in orbit around a planet or the Sun.

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Handout 4
Solar-Powered Plane Completes Historic 'Across America' Flight
By Meera Dolasia on July 9, 2013

Solar Impulse, the world's first single passenger solar-powered airplane has come a long
way since its first flight in 2009, when it rose a mere 3 feet above the ground and flew for
just 1,150 feet in the 30 seconds it was in air. In 2012, the elegant green flying machine
successfully completed an intercontinental trip from Europe to Africa and on July 6th,
2013, added another feather or should we say 'wing' to its cap, with a flight across the
United States of America.
The first leg of the solar plane's 'Across America' journey began on May 3rd from San
Francisco, California. Taking off from NASA's Moffett Field with Bertrand Piccard at the
helm, it took the airplane that sports a 207-foot wingspan, 19 hours at a top speed of
45km/h, to complete the initial leg to Phoenix, Arizona.

Following a two-week stay during which over 2,200 local residents had the opportunity
to admire the sleek airplane up close, it took off again on May 22nd - This time around,
the 936-mile journey to Dallas, Texas, the longest ever completed by a manned solarpowered airplane was completed by Captain Andre Borschberg.

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On June 2nd, the airplane began its third leg to St. Louis, Missouri. The 21 hr 22 min,
630 mile trip proved to be quite eventful. Not only did the Solar Impulse experience its
first flight below ice-filled cirrus clouds, but it also, got a chance to test out its own
inflatable hanger because a severe thunderstorm had damaged the one that had been
slated to house it. Not surprisingly, it worked like a charm!

The excitement did not end there - High winds on the way to its next destination,
Washington D.C, forced the organizers to change the route slightly and instead reroute to
Cincinnati, Ohio for a few days, before heading to the nation's capital on June 16th, 2013.
The final leg, an 18 hour flight to New York City, began in the wee hours of July 6th,
2013. A planned flyover the Statue of Liberty had to be canceled after a tear appeared on
the underside of the airplane's left wing. By the time it landed at John F. Kennedy airport
at 11 pm EST, the solar-powered plane had flown a total of 105 hours and 41 minutes at
an average speed of 33.14 mph to complete the 3,511-mile, coast-to-coast journey.

While the Solar Impulse HB-SIA, the only solar-powered airplane capable of flying day
and night has the same wingspan as the Airbus 380, it weighs only 2 tons as compared to
the 400 ton weight of a fully-laden A380. It comprises of 12,000 solar cells fitted onto the
airplane's long wingspan, that capture the sun's energy and transfer it to four 10-hp
electric motors. The solar cells also help charge the 882 pounds of lithium batteries that
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power the airplane at night. In order to conserve and store as much captured energy as
possible, the airplane is programmed to travel at reduced speeds even during midday
hours, when the sun is at its peak.
With this latest 'Across America' mission out of the way, the jubilant Swiss
inventors/pilots - Bernard Piccard and Andre Borschberg are now preparing for the
ultimate test - A journey around the world. For this epic trip, the duo plan to use the next
generation solar plane - HB-SIB, which will be capable of carrying two people. Mr.
Piccard who keeps breaking new ground with every flight, is no stranger to fame - In
1999, the adventurer made headlines after completing a non-stop journey around the
world in a hot air balloon!

Though solar-powered planes have a long way to go before they can be used for
commercial flying, the Solar Impulse certainly brings them a step closer to reality. To
read more about this fascinating aircraft check out solarimpulse.com.

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Handout 5
Factors of Motion Organizer
Fearless Felix
Breaks The Sound
Barrier!

What is Orbit?

Force(s) Present

Description of
Mass(es)

Evidence of
Acceleration

Evidence of
Velocity

Object(s) in
Motion

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Solar-Powered
Plane Completes
Historic 'Across
America' Flight

Handout 6
Questioning Cube

What factors must be

involved for an object to
be in motion?

How does the

gravitational pull
accelerate a free fall?

How does the mass of an

object impact its motion?

How does speed and

velocity differ?

How does aerodynamics

relate to the acceleration of an
object?

Handout 7

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15

If friction is decreased,
how might this affect an
object in motion?

Acceleration and Velocity Image Sort

Most Acceleration/ Velocity

Least Acceleration/ Velocity

Images

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16

Maintaining a
Constant Force

Maintaining a
Constant Force

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Handout 8
3-2-1

As you respond to the prompts below, use all words in the

Word Splash at least once.
3 points relating Mass, Force and Motion to
Acceleration and Velocity

2 ways to change the acceleration or velocity

1 real world example (not previously described) of

acceleration or velocity incorporating Mass, Force and
Motion

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