KS 4 Distance Time graphs Boardworks Ltd 2003

KS 4 Distance Time graphs © Boardworks Ltd 2003

Car Graphing Activity This graphing experiment shows a movie of a car travelling along a straight road. Copy the results table shown on the next slide and complete it as the movie is played. Record the distance the car has travelled every five seconds. Then graph your results. Note that there are teacher’s notes, in “Notes View” on this slide. See teacher’s notes © Boardworks Ltd 2003

Results table for Distance / Time Graph Time/Seconds 0 5 10 Distance/Metres 15 20 25 30 35 40 45 50 55 © Boardworks Ltd 2003

Results table for Distance / Time Graph Time/Seconds 0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 45 50 55 Distance/Metres 0 16 76 186 234 484 634 784 904 974 994 © Boardworks Ltd 2003

The car has stopped: The line is flat – the distance of the car from the start point The linecar on is thestarting graph to is not straight, so we know the move. is not changing. Theofcurve car going fast but atspeed a constant speed theiscar is changing. The shows that the is changing. The line is straight – meaning that there is no CHANGE in The lineisisdownwards straight in as this region of the down graph. at The curve the car slows curve is upwards as the car accelerates at the end speed. of the movie. start of the movie. © Boardworks Ltd 2003

Gradient of a Distance / Time Graph The speed of the car can be calculated by looking at the gradient of the Distance / Time graph. Speed is “Distance Travelled divided by Time Taken” Both these values can be read off the Distance / Time graph, and this is the same as the gradient of the line. © Boardworks Ltd 2003

Look at the straight line part of this graph shown by the two arrows in a triangle. The car has travelled from 200 m to 800 m, = 600 m The car has taken from 16 s to 36 s to travel this distance = 20 seconds Therefore the speed is 600 divided by 20 = 30 m/s © Boardworks Ltd 2003