Every week, students participate in a number of classroom activities as they explore the various subjects they are enrolled in. Hands-on experiences, such as labs, provide students incredible opportunities to visualize how the skills they are learning apply in the real world. One class that recently took part in a lab was Mr. Middleton’s physics honors class. Recently having learned about motion and kinematics (a branch of physics involved with describing the motion of objects using mathematics), the students of Mr. Middleton’s class ventured to building ten where they proceeded to drop various objects off the outdoor staircases.
“I took physics because I plan to go into some kind of stem field; physics is typically very helpful in that process,” said junior Joseph Houk who took part in the lab. Joseph described his role in the lab, explaining that it was his job to drop the object from the staircase while saying “start.” The time it took to reach the ground was recorded. Once this process had been repeated a number of times, Joseph used predefined physics equations to calculate the acceleration of gravity on the Earth’s surface. “Despite how precise you try to be, it is very difficult to get exact, perfect results in science experiments,” Joseph explained. This factor played an important role in the lab; getting the exact acceleration at the surface of the earth by using the data from this experiment was virtually impossible. Nevertheless, labs and other hands-on activities can be an exciting and rewarding way for students to experience the subjects they are learning in the real world.
