Newton's Laws
Newton’s first law of motion: Objects at rest will stay at rest, and objects in motion will stay in
motion in a straight line unless they are acted upon by a force.
See how force causes an object to change in motion?
Newton's Second Law: Force is equal to mass multiplied by acceleration. (F = ma)
I wanted to make a Make a Catapult but we could not find the metal banding it requires. If you can, this might be a good demonstration of Newton's Second Law. These other two toys also demonstrate this Law, however. Using the Zoom Ball, have your students pull their hands apart at differing speeds; the faster they pull their hands apart, the greater the force exerted on the ball, which will make the ball zoom to the other end faster. For the balloon rocket, the more air initially in the balloon, the further the balloon travels along the string because the action force is greater. You can have your students experiment with this by putting different amounts of air in the balloon and noting how far the balloon propels.
Newton's Third Law: For every action there is an equal and opposite reaction.
Although this activity demonstrates all three of Newton's laws of motion, the focus of the activity is Newton's third law of motion. The air pushing its way out of the balloon is an action force, and it causes an equal reaction, which is the movement of the balloon.
