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How many sports can you think of where nothing moves? Now think about sports where something not only moves, but moves along an irregular path. Can you think of more than the sports that are shown in this collage? For some of the moving objects (such as in tennis or hockey), the equipment has changed a lot through the years. Do you think many professional tennis players still use wooden racquets? How about hockey players—are many still using wooden sticks? When a scientific approach is applied to sports equipment, it changes the sport. A scientific approach also affects most areas of our lives. How does physics come into play? Would you like the wings of the airplane you’re flying in to fall off? Physics helped the engineers build a plane as strong as it’s needed yet not any heavier than needed.
In this module you will analyze motion along paths that are not straight lines. You will see how the motion of an object can be calculated and how it can be applied in sports and in many other real-life situations. As you are working in Module 2, you should keep the following questions in mind. They should help you fit the world of kinematics into your everyday world.
Essential questions for you to consider in this module are as follows:
How do vectors help explain two-dimensional motion?
In what ways can data be used to distinguish differing types of motion?
In what ways can mathematics be used to help understand motion?
How can observations and questions help explain what is seen in everyday life?