Unit 2 Post - 6/16: In the Fast Lane With No Direction

Physics is really forcing me to look at my world in a different way, and I love it! The subtle, yet imperative differences between distance and displacement or speed and velocity are direct applications to my world! Critical thinking is a big part of our educational growth, and now when I go running on a track versus running a trail, I have a deeper understanding of that! When I'm fast-walking to class because I'm late, but then stop for five minutes to talk to a friend, I can understand the science behind that!

It's hard to point to one specific thing and say that it was the most important aspect from unit 2. All of it was new to me, all of it was important to me, all of it taught me something new that allowed me to see things in a different light! The two pictures (... one of which that INVOLVES MY PARENTS ; ) above present the variety of topics we learned about. We were all headed to Tommy Bahama's at Waikele for some Father's Day Shopping. I decided to take my bike (not actually MY bike for the record) while my parents drove in order to represent speed and velocity. The van can go much faster than me, therefore it has a greater speed and therefore a greater velocity (it's slope on a line graph would be steeper). However, we are headed to same destination so we were moving in the same direction and traveled (about) the same distance. After we went shopping, we returned home; back where we started. Thus, even though we moved at different speeds and velocities, we traveled the same distance and had a displacement of zero. Funny how this stuff seems so confusing in the classroom but truly comes alive in our day to day.