Exploration
Galileo Galilei is often considered one of the founders of modern science. This is because he investigated questions through experimentation and observations. One of his most famous experiments involved dropping cannonballs of different mass to determine whether they would accelerate to the ground at different rates.
Many at the time thought the mass of an object determined an object’s acceleration in free fall. After all, doesn’t a cannonball, which is heavy, fall faster than a feather, which is light? Galileo wanted to test this assumption using the scientific method.
Objective
In this experiment, students will:
1. Use the accelerometer to determine whether objects in free fall accelerate to the ground at different rates.
2. Explain the collected data and observations using an understanding of Net Force.
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