4-8

Today, Wednesday April 8, 2009, was a very exciting day of Physics. We began the day by announcing the results of yesterday’s Physics Olympics. We were all very pleased with the effort our classmates, two of which got awards for getting an honorable mention and 2nd place overall, great job! After discussing a little bit about how the Olympics went, Mr. Manning told us to get straight to work on our design-a-ride projects, which I think everyone was looking forward to doing. I will begin by explaining a little bit about what this project is all about, in case you were absent today or yesterday. In anticipation of our Hershey park field trip, Mr. Manning wants us to design (and build if you want for extra credit) a working roller coaster of your choice. The task is to then present your completed design to a theme park organization such as Hershey Park. The project will take 4 weeks, and is worth 100 points total, so work hard to make sure you get a good grade. I think that this is going to be a very fun project and everyone is excited to get started. Today, most of the groups began their projects by brainstorming what kind of roller coaster ride they wanted to create. Everyone had very interesting ideas. My personal favorite, which we will be using in our project is called the “Mammoth” roller coaster. This roller coaster takes you //inside// the woolly mammoth itself, traveling through its stomach, trunk, feet, and where the roller coaster ends, the behind. Take a look at the intricate design: We are very excited to build our roller coaster because there is no other roller coaster like it, and no one has done it before, it won’t be easy but we are looking forward to the challenge. Well that just about wraps up what we did today, have a fun and safe holiday!