Students in Ms. Czerwinski's 11th grade Physics classes recently worked on a fun and challenging project to learn some of the most important concepts in energy and motion. The project involved the design and construction of a rollercoaster using foam pipe insulation, wood dowels, wood bases and a marble for testing. The goal is to construct a rollercoaster with a minimum of two loops or the combination of one loop and one corkscrew.  The marble needs to travel as fast as possible down the coaster but also to significantly slow down at the end.

The slow-down is checked by holding a raw egg at the end of the coaster track and allowing the marble to hit it without causing any cracks in the egg.  Measurement and calculation of potential and kinetic energy is also part of the project.  This requires the students to use various measurement devices such as metersticks, stop watches, digital balances, digital calipers, CBL’s with graphing calculators and photogate timing devices.