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Bike Lane Data: Mass, Speed and Kinetic Energy

Grade 8 kinetic energy practice: read a bar graph and a table from a bike safety unit to compare how mass and speed change kinetic energy.

Grade 8ScienceInteractive · Printable

Aligned toMS-PS3-1

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What’s included

Single worksheet
Auto-graded online
1 NGSS standard
Printable answer key
10 questions
Classroom-ready

Details

Format: Interactive · Printable
Grade: Grade 8
Subject: Science
Question types: Fill in the blank, Multiple choice, Sorting, Short answer

About this worksheet

What students practice

Students use a graph and a table to describe how kinetic energy depends on mass and on speed.
Students use the relationship between kinetic energy, mass and speed to compare and predict energy values.

How to use

Look at the graph and the table side by side first and ask which variable is held constant in each. Calculators are helpful for the prediction questions.

Curriculum

NGSS standard covered

MS-PS3-1

Use graphs and tables to show how kinetic energy depends on an object's mass and its speed.

Preview

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Name Date

Bike Lane Data: Mass, Speed and Kinetic Energy

Use a graph and a table to see how kinetic energy depends on mass and speed.

Read the bike data

Read the passage, then use the graph and the table to answer.

Why Speed Limits on the River Trail?

1The city of Riverbend is thinking about a speed limit for bicycles on its busy River Trail, where riders share the path with walkers and runners. Coach Darnell Ngata's eighth-grade physical science class decided to collect data for the city council. On a closed school parking lot, volunteers rode bicycles past a radar speed sign while classmates recorded each speed in meters per second (m/s). Before riding, each volunteer stood on a scale with the bike, so the class knew the total mass of rider plus bike in kilograms.

2A moving object has kinetic energy, measured in joules (J). The class calculated the kinetic energy of each rider with the formula KE = ½ × m × v², where m is the total mass in kilograms and v is the speed in meters per second. A rider with more kinetic energy needs more work from the brakes to stop, and in a collision more energy goes into whatever the bike hits.

3First, the class kept the speed the same. Four volunteers with different total masses rode past the sign at 4 m/s, which is about the speed of a relaxed ride. The bar graph shows their kinetic energy.

4Next, the class kept the mass the same. Student Lucia Ferreira, whose total mass with her bike is 60 kg, rode past the sign four times at different speeds. The table shows her results. The class plans to present both data sets to the council and recommend a limit that keeps riders' energy low near walkers.