Top Ten Uses of Physics at Ingles

In this final blog post, I am going to discuss 10 different ways in which you will see physics at a shopping center such as Ingles.

 
One: Payment using a credit card

When you gather up all of the stuff you are going to buy, you might have to use a credit card to pay for all of it. But while you're standing there waiting for the cashier to say "you can swipe", think of what is going to happen.

On a credit card, there is magnetic strip that has magnetic sectors. On the black strip on the top of the back of the card, there is a code made up of many different coils going in different directions. The reader has different coils of wire that line up when voltage from the card gets induced into it when the card slides through. The computer will then interpret the code and will take your money.

Two: The shopping carts
When you are pushing around the shopping carts at the store, you start adding more items into the cart and then you suddenly think that because there are so many things in the cart, you are doing so much work. But this is where physics rolls in! You are actually exerting some work. The force, which is the cart, is being pulled down by gravity and it is a combination of force and distance. We know that with work, the force and distance must be parallel...therefore when you push the cart towards that check out section, you are exerting work. The formula for work is work=force*distance. For example, if this picture of the stick figure was you, the way this equation would work out is by solving this problem: 

work=force*distance

work=20*2

work=20 Joules

But lets say you were only buying a few items and needed to go to the 10 or less items check out and instead used a basket, you would not be doing any work. This is because the force and distance would no longer be parallel, it would be perpendicular. Look to the right, to see why; you are walking forward and the basket is being pulled down by gravity. So even though that basket might seem heavier, you are doing more work pushing that cart.

Three: The parking lot
In the parking lot, you see a lot of physics. When you're walking in or walking out, there is always a car that is trying to pull out and drive into the parking lot. Then there is the annoying car that will wait until you have loaded all of your groceries into the car so that they can steal your spot. As you may know, moving cars have a certain amount of acceleration and are traveling at a certain velocity. If somehow you want to know how fast or the distance a car traveled, you can use these formulas:

• the how fast formula: velocity=(acceleration)(time)

• this formula is basically used for any time the question is asking how fast something went. one must plug in the numbers for the known, and find the unknown.

• how fast describes velocity

• the how far formula: 

• distance=1/2(acceleration)(time^2)

• how far describes distance

 In these two equations, you see a lot about acceleration. Acceleration is: the change in velocity / time interval. The unit used for acceleration is meters/seconds^2. 
Here is a picture to show you the equation:

 

Four: The can explosion
Oh, you clumsy, you. You were trying to reach for your favorite can of canned fruit and on accident you pushed the one next to the one you wanted over. This causes three of the cans to fall off of the top shelf. 

 

This can be considered 'free falling'. In free fall, there are many things to remember:

1. There is no air resistance

1. The only force acting on it is gravity

1. It is at a constant 10m/s

1. It does not matter what the weight of the objects are, gravity is the only thing that matters and like I stated before, it is 10m/s^2

This is how you know that it is due to gravity alone:

But also, if you want to think of all of those cans just sitting on those shelves day after day, you will think of Newton's Third Law which states that with every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction.

For example, take a look at this can sitting on the shelf:

The can is pulling the Earth up, while the Earth pulls the canned soup down. But if you want to get into logistics with the shelf included, there is a whole other relationship between either the can and table or the earth and shelf. In order to figure out the relationships between objects using Newton's third, you must use action-reaction pairs. In order to create action/reaction pairs, there are three rules that must always be followed.

1. The verb must always remain the same (pulls/pulls, push/push, hit/hit)

1. The direction that was stated first, must be opposite at the end (up/down, left/right)

1. The object must stay the same and then switch 

Five: Electricity at the store
When you're at the store shopping for your favorite food, you may not think of all of the electricity that is going into powering that one store alone. 
For example:

1. The small lights that go above these vegetables to make them presentable. Also, the timers that are put into the mist shooters in order to make them 'fresh'.

1. All the lightning that makes the supermarket navigable at day or night.

1. Yo. These refrigerators use up so much energy with the lights that have to be on to show the products and the generators that make the products cold.

Have you ever tried to ask yourself how so there can be so much electricity in one store? Here is the answer:

Electric Power:

Electric power is the rate in which electric energy is converted into another form. For example, heat and light because they are different forms of electricity. Power is measured with direct proportionality between current and voltage. 

The equation for power is: power=I*V

The measurements for this equation: watts=amperes*volts

 If you care to know what current and voltage is:
Current:
Current is the flow of electricity that is caused by movement of particles that is measured in amperes (I). There are two types of current: alternating and direct; alternating current is when the current constantly switches directions and direct current is when it doesn't...its that simple!
Voltage:
Voltage is basically the amount of potential energy something has over the number of coulombs it has. Use this equation to figure out voltage: V=pe/q.  
 
Six: Wheels

Let us just say that you're at one of the largest Ingles Supermarkets in the state of North Carolina. You want to know a little bit about your speed while you're there...or at least the speed of the cart when you are pushing it. This lesson about rotational//linear speed will help you with the speed of the wheels.
Linear speed is the same thing as just saying speed. Speed is the distance traveled over a unit of time. When you travel a greater distance it means you are increasing your speed as well. Remember it like this: greater distance means greater speed. Rotational speed also called angular speed is the calculation of the number of rotations an object does over a unit of time.  When you have a greater RPM, it is faster in speed.
The carts at the supermarkets almost always have four small wheels because four will keep the cart the most stable and if you've noticed the wheels are usually really small. Why wouldn't you use big wheels? The effect of using big wheels means that it will go a greater distance but slower, but if smaller wheels are used, the cart will travel faster but a shorter distance and this is ideal because you are rushing to get to the different aisles but you are not traveling a long distance because you are constantly stopping to pick something up.

Seven: Your mom is mad
So your mom is ready to leave the store with the groceries that she intended to buy but then she realizes that she forgot something. She is too lazy to go get it and the cashier is waiting for her to finish the transaction. She makes you sprint to go get it and along the way you pick up your favorite snack too. But if you don't hurry up she is going to be mad.
So you decided to sprint. Running has a lot of physics involved as well. All runners bend their legs when they run because they are moving their legs closer to their axis of rotation which is their hips. This is a property of the lesson on rotational inertia. Rotational inertia depends on the distribution of mass and also the property of an object to resist changes in the spin. If there is more rotational inertia it is harder to spin, if there is less, it is easier to spin.  Therefore, runners bring their mass closer to the axis of rotation to lower their rotational inertia. The farther away from the axis of rotation, the higher rotational inertia an object has. So next time your mom is rushing you to go get something she forgot to pick up on her list, you will know how to run faster. 

Eight: Leaving Ingles and what do you see?
When you're leaving Ingles you walk out of the sliding door and see the big delivery truck pulling up to the store. The man who is doing all of the work is struggling to get all of the products out of the truck because he is simply just grabbing the products and carrying them off of the truck. You, being a physics expert, help him up by asking him if he has a ramp...

 

 A ramp is a machine. To be more specific, it is a simple machine. A machine is used to multiply force or just to make your job completing a task a little bit easier. Machines reduce or change force but your energy and work will always remain the same. There is a concept called the principle of machines which we learned is related to the conservation of energy. When work is put in there is an equal amount of work out.

work in=work out

Force in times distance in = force out times distance out
For example, in the image above, if the man didn't use the ramp, it would take much more force to load the box with a shorter distance than it if you just added a ramp.

the work put in when you use the ramp is= fd

work out when not using the ramp= fd

But at the end, the work in still ends up equaling the work out, just that the two factors in the equation are increased or decreased.

Nine: A box sliding down that ramp

Created on Paint

First, we learned about vectors which are arrows that show magnitude and direction. 

In order to create the middle arrow that will show you in which direction the object will go, you must draw a parallelogram like the one on the right hand side.

 The purple arrow represents the direction that the object will end up going in. 

But really, why does a box actually slide down a ramp?

Okay, well first here are all of the forces that are acting on the box.

1. Support force: a force that is always perpendicular to the surface
2. Fweight/gravity which is pulling box down onto ramp
3. It has a fnet which is sliding the box down the ramp

And that's basically it!

Ten: Pulling the full basket//Net force
Net force is essential when looking at whether objects are in motion or at rest. First, we had to learn what force was. Force is a push or a pull that is measured in Newtons. A Newton is basically a quarter of a pound. After learning what a force was, I learned that a net force was the overall force on an object when all forces are added together. .

When the shopping cart is full of all the food and other necessities that you purchased, you may need the help of a parent or sibling to push the cart. Look at this experience in the physics aspect. For example, if you are on one side (ie: the left) pushing the cart with 400N and your parent or sibling is pushing on the right side 300N as well in the same direction, you would need to add these two forces together, because they are going in the same direction, and you would get a net force of 700N. (Pretend the box is the shopping cart..imagination people).

 

Wind: A blog about a turbine

 WIND TURBINE 101

This blog post demonstrates key concepts that one must know in order to build a model wind turbine. Keep in mind, this lab is not easy but once it is completed, its pretty cool and a lot of physics is learned. 

Primary Concepts:

The primary physics concepts a person would need to know in order to comprehend how my turbine is supposed to work are:

1.  How a generator works
   A generator functions with mechanical energy being put into it and at the end electrical energy is the output. A generator is made of coils of wire and magnets which is why our generator which was a 2 coil generator is placed the way it is shown in the picture. The main concept that shows how this turbine works is electromagnetic induction. 
2. Also, based on the conservation of energy, I learned that energy is not created or destroyed. Rather, it changes into a different form, like heat. So the when the wind turbine works, there is energy being produced which makes it spin, but the energy is not lost at all.
3. Rotational inertia is another concept that is essential in this lab because we know that inertia is the property of an object to resist changes in motion. But we also know about rotational inertia which is a type of inertia that depends on the distribution of mass and also the property of an object to resist changes in the spin. If there is more rotational inertia it is harder to spin, if there is less, it is easier to spin. When there is a small rotational inertia, the turbine works faster but when there is a larger rotational inertia, the wind turbine might respond a little late. ie: the blades.
   
   
   The way a generator works is already included in the first part. but to elaborate a little more on the relationship between the coils of wire and the magnets is that the coils must be tightly compact so that the small magnets can feel a force and cause the turbine to spin. The coils of wire are meant to be opposite from each other in a vertical direction. This is because all the charges in the wires have to be moving the same way similar to the motor blog that I posted in the past few weeks.
   Materials + Methods:
   -coils of wire
   -black tape
   -four small magnets
   -long 2'' PVC pipe
   -tee PVC pipe
   
    -cardboard (for blades)
   -small wooden circles to connect everything
   If you look at the images below, you will be able to recreate this project in as little as an hour or two.
   
   
   
   
   
   
   

 






Results:
Our voltage was about 4.8 volts. The factors that I think influenced our turbine was the thickness of the coil or possibly what type of generator we created. Maybe if the coils of wire were wrapped more compact, it would have worked better. Also, the amount of magnets makes a difference; in our case we used four but an issue that we ran into was that while trying to hot glue north poles opposite from each other and south poles opposite from each other, leaving north and south poles adjacent to each other, the magnets kept on being attracted wanting to stick together. It took us many tries to make sure they didn't move and a lot of hot glue. Something else that worked was using a tee PVC pipe, because originally we planned on using an elbow PVC pipe and now realized that that would not have worked. Also while building your model, you must make sure that the blades are pretty equivalent to the size of your tower because if they are two big the fan will not do anything to help. Something I would have done differently is to include a wooden base instead of just holding our PVC pipe up the entire time.

UNIT 7: Blog Reflection

Unit Seven ended much quicker than Unit Six. In this unit, we discussed everything about magnetism (poles, fields, domains, etc.), transformers, current, generators, and so much more.

Topics:

Magnetism:
The first essential question we learned in this unit was "why does a paperclip stick to a magnet?". By the end of this, I will answer this question.

The idea of magnetism is basically moving charges that cause objects//things to be magnetic.

To understand this ideology, we learned a lot of smaller components about this. 

A domain is a cluster of electrons all spinning the same way. At first, a domain can be unaligned meaning that the cluster of electrons are all spinning in different directions, but magnetism causes the domain to be aligned.

After learning this, we learned about magnetic poles. Magnetic poles are each of the two points or regions of an artificial or natural magnet to and from which the lines of magnetic force are directed. In the real world, we call these poles the south pole and north pole. These two poles are obviously on each end of a magnet. 

With poles, there is a specific way that magnets will connect based on their side. Previously, we learned that unlike poles (for example: the north and south pole) attract and like poles (such as north and north or south and south) will repel. The way we can tell whether the poles are attracting or repelling is by their field lines. In unlike poles, the field lines will run in the same direction while with like poles the field lines will point in opposite directions like in the image below.

 

Knowing this information, we can understand the question mentioned above "why does a paperclip stick to a magnet?" This can be explained in four steps:

1. The domains in a paperclip are random (because it is not magnetic...yet!). A domain is a cluster of electrons that are spinning in the same direction.
2. A magnet has a magnetic field which is a region around a magnetic material or a moving electric charge within which the force of magnetism acts. 
3. When the magnet is close to the paperclip, the domains in the paperclip become aligned to math the magnetic field of the magnet.  
4. After this, the magnet now has a magnetic poles (north and south) and the north pole of the paperclip is attracted to the south pole of the magnet because opposites attract and that is how the paperclip sticks to a magnet.

We learned a couple of random facts that would help us understan magnetism a little better. Things such as:

The force between any two charged particles depends on the magnitude of the charge and their distance of separation. 

The force due to the motion of charged particles is called the magnetic force.

Electrical and magnetic forces are part of the same ideology of electromagnetism as you can tell because the root is electro and the ending says magnetism.

An electromagnet is a current carrying cool of wire and the strength is based on an increasing or decreasing current.

Still on the topic of magnetism and electromagnetism, we learned the essential question of "how does a credit card machine work?"

To answer the question, you need to answer it in four parts:

1. A credit card has a magnetic strip on it that has different magnetized sectors forming a code

2. There is code on the magnetic strip. 

3. The reader has different coils of wire that line up and there is voltage induced in it when the strip slides through the machine.

4. The computer screen interprets electric signals back to coding and takes your money.

That was a culmination of individuals objects magnetized with other objects. 

Transformers

Next, we learned about transformers.

Transformers are machines that transfer energy from a primary to a secondary circuit. Transformers have a more efficient arrangement. A transformer, in simpler terms, is used for increasing or decreasing voltage.

Because it has alternating voltage: we must use the equation

Primary voltage/number of primary turns equals secondary voltage/number of secondary turns.

The problem given will always tell which one is the primary and secondary but sometimes based on the information given, they require you to know which is which.
A primary circuit is the circuit that is closest to the outlet and inputs energy. The secondary circuit is the one which is closest to the device and releases energy. If you've ever seen a computer charger, you notice that it comes with a box...have you ever thought about the use of that? That box is a transformer that allows your computer to charge. The way a transformer looks like is just two coil of wire just like what you see below:

Alternating current or AC runs through the primary coil which causes the whole thing to have a change in the magnetic field. DC or direct current cannot be used for a transformer because the current it produces only moves in one direction. AC current continuously changes the direction of the current, which is what causes change in the magnetic field in the first place. The number of turns in the wire is directly proportional to the voltage induced. The more turns in the wire, the more voltage there will be. The less turns the less voltage there will be. If the secondary has more turns the primary. That is why we use the formula that I wrote above.

We also learned about step up and step down transformers. A step up transformer means that the secondary circuit will have more turns than the primary.  If the secondary has less turns than the primary it will have less voltage than the primary and the voltage will be called a step down transformer.

Difficulty: 
This unit was the second hardest unit of the year for me. Once again, there was a lot more material that we covered in a small amount of time, less blog posts to help me, and a change in teaching styles as Ms. Lawrence left. I found that memorizing all the big problems and having to remember all the different equations in order to solve a problem right was hard for me.


Problem-Solving Skills, Effort, and Learning:
Effort in class: I don't think I was able to contribute in class as I have in the past because this unit was really difficult and I usually learn better by intaking the information first and then giving it back verbally but it took me a while to understand the concepts.
Homework: I learned a lot from doing the homework problems because in this unit the outside of class assignments were what tied everything together for me.

Goals:
Do well on the test tomorrow and do well on the final by studying the videos, reviewing podcasts, blogposts, and notes.
Connections:
Many of the connections that I saw outside of class were already put into Part A. 
Podcast:
In this unit we did not do podcasts. Sorry!   

NON-WORKING: Motor

First of all, let it be known that my motor did not function at all. In the rest of this post I will explain the motor's use and how to make one using my peers' experiences with this project.

The parts that we used for this mini motor were:

• paperclips
• an Energizer battery
• coil of wire
• a strong magnet
• black tape

A working motor has to look like this:

Taken from Cori's Blog

The paperclips were used to connect the battery to the coil of wire for it to complete a circuit because a conductor is necessary for a circuit to be completed. 

The Energizer battery provides current for the whole system to function.

The coil of wire's use is to carry the current through the whole system and when it actually works, the coil of wire//motor loop is supposed to spin. 

The strong magnet creates a magnetic field which creates a force on the coil of wire and causes it to spin.

The black tape, shown in the image, was used to keep the whole thing together and to connect some parts.

Because a motor has a current carrying wire that feels a force because of the magnetic field from the magnet, the more wire and stronger magnet, the stronger the force. This force comes from the coil of wire which changes the direction of the magnetic field. The coil of the wire was scaraped on one side on both ends so that the current in the coil of the wire would change the direction each time it turned halfway.
The motor turns because it has a magnet which causes a magnetic field//force. Also, the coil of wire had to be facing vertically because it had to be perpendicular to the magnet.

In the future, this motor project could be used to make something that moves if you attach wheels or maybe if you connect it to something else, it can become some kind of generator.
My motor did not work because I think we did not scrape our wire enough and also I don't think we wrapped it the way it was supposed to be done. We did make our system similar to this one because we used the same parts ecept for the rubber bands but I believe this was the main issue.

Once again, I'd like to thank Cori for sharing her blog and here is a video of how hers worked.

Take a look at a different way this could have been done.

UNIT 6: Blog Reflection

Unit Six was a whole section on energy and electricity. We got to work with light bulbs and learned why a lot of things happened to us like our hair standing up and how lightning worked. Hopefully, this reflection will help with the many difficult concepts we discussed in the past few weeks.

Energy and Electricity:
The essential question was: How does a battery, wires, and light bulb fit together to make the light bulb light up? This was a lab in which we were given a battery and some other objects and we were asked to light a bulb with no knowledge of what to do. Eventually, we got it. Our design looked like the picture on the right. It lit up with the wire like that because it completed a full circuit.

1. Direct contact
2. Friction in which they steal electrons from each other
3. Induction which is charge without contact
1. A good example of induction is lightning

We also learned about how the outlets in our houses work. They only work because electricity flows in a circuit which makes appliances light up. There are several parts in what makes outlets work: ground wires are wires that complete a direct path to the ground when it takes the oath of least resistance.
It was also interesting to learn how much the energy we use everyday cost. Appliances like the ones below were pretty cool to see.

Charges:
Next we learned about charges and how they affect us and the objects that surround us. Some of the essential question were: why does our hair stand up after putting on a sweater or why does our hair stand up when we rub a balloon on our heads.
I learned that there are three types of charges: positive, negative, and neutral. When it is positive, there are more protons in the system than electrons, when it is negatively charged it is the opposite. But when we say neutral charge, we mean that there is an equal amount of protons and electrons.
Because I stated that there are positive and negatively charged things, there has to be a way in which they become this way. 

Polarization:

In this unit, we learned about how neutral objects become polarized. Knowing that there are three different types of charges, polarization is the explanation for why they are charged and what makes them charged. Polarization has to do with two objects being polar. Polarization can be found in conductors and insulators because a conductor lets charges move through the object and insulators stop charges from moving. Polarization is basically the separation of charges. A polarized object is still neutral because the charges are only separating; the electron count is not changing. Coulomb’s law relates to polarization because it is the force between any two charges and is inversely proportional to distance. This law is written like so: 

With this law, when there is a large distance there is a smaller force and when there is a small distance there is a larger force. 

An example of this is when someone puts plastic wrap on a metal bowl. When the plastic wrap is charged by friction when brought near the bowl, the bowl is polarized. The positive charges in the bowl move close to the negative plastic wrap an the negative charges move away.

Then the distance between the opposite attractive charges is smaller than the distance between the repelling. 

Another problem that is extremely important in this unit is the balloon problem. The balloon rubbing on your head and then being placed on the wall is a big problem because it describes many aspects of electricity and charges. 

First, the balloon takes electrons from your hair. It is charged by friction because they are directly in contact. Now, this means that the balloon is negatively charged. When it is placed on the wall, the neutral wall polarizes. Positive charges move closer to the baloon. Negative charges move away because opposites attract and like charges repel. The distance between the opposite attractive charges is less than the distance between the like repulsive charges because of Coulomb's law as I described earlier. Because the attractive force is larger, the balloon sticks to the wall.

Electric Fields:

An electric field is the area around a charge that can push or pull another charge. It is basically the direction that the positive particle goes. The arrows around an electric field also show the strength of the electric field and also the direction. The closer the lines are the stronger electric field and the further apart they are, the weaker the field is.

Electric shielding relates to electric fields and happens when something is placed in a metal container and the charges will distribute evenly no matter where they are. 

To find the strength of an electric force, we use the equation E=force/charge or E=f/q because the charge is per coulomb. 

Voltage:

Voltage has to do with a charge difference. There is something called electro-motive force which is when there is a bigger charge difference/bigger voltage, the bigger force electrons will feel. Another word we use to associate potential difference is voltage. It is derived from potential energy because there is a potential energy between two points. In other words, it is a measure of how much energy we can get out of one coulomb of charge. The change in potential energy is the same as the kinetic energy. The formula for voltage is the potential energy divided by each coulomb of charge. V=pe/q Voltage is measured in Volts.

To put this formula into use, here is an example: If a 3 Coulomb charge has 12 Joules of potential energy at some point in space, what is the value of the electric potential?

V=PE/q

V=12/3

V= 4V

Current:

Then we learned about current, how to measure it, and the different types of current there are. 

Current is the flow of electricity that is caused by movement of particles that is measured in amperes (I). The two types of current there are are:

1. Direct current which is when the flowing of charges in one direction. Some devices that have this type of current are: batteries and laptops.
2. Alternating current is when electrons in the current are moving in opposite directions at some amount of time. For example, a household current. 

In order to convert these current we use diodes which are devices to convert ac-->dc

To complete a circuit, there must be current. Current happens when there is change in voltage. There is an example in class about birds sitting on wires. The reason why birds aren’t harmed when sitting on a power line wire is because If a bird was standing on only one wire, they did not complete a circuit because they aren’t touching the ground  and they aren’t touching the two wires at the same time. This means there’s no current meaning that there is no electric potential difference. But if it were flying and both of its wings happened to touch each wire, there would be a complete circuit which would harm a bird. 

Resistance:

Resistance is the property of a material that resists electric current. When resistance is high, current is low and vice versa. It is measured in Ohm's and can be written with the letter R to represent it. The resistance of objects like wires depends on the thickness and length. The thicker, the shorter, and the better conductor material, and the colder the wire is, the wire is the less resistance there will be meaning there will be more current. But light bulb companies should make filaments thinner and longer to have bulbs that have a smaller current but bigger resistance so they would last longer. Earlier I mentioned that resistance was measured in Ohms. Ohm's law states that current in a circuit is directly proportional to voltage and is inversely proportional to resistance of the circuit.
The law is written like so: current = voltage/resistance
The law in measurements is: amps = volts /ohms

Electric Power:

Electric power is the rate in which electric energy is converted into another form. For example, heat and light because they are different forms of electricity. Power is measured with direct proportionality between current and voltage. 

The equation for power is: power=I*V

The measurements for this equation: watts=amperes*volts

There is also a relationship with power and energy and that is just power=energy/time

Circuits:

Lastly, in this unit we discovered two different types of circuits. We looked at series and parallel circuits. 

Series Circuits:

In a series circuit, all of the things that are plugged in are following one path in which they are all connected. If you remove one things, the rest of the things go out. In a series circuit, resistance is added together, voltage also adds, but the current remains the same.

Parallel Circuits:

In parallel circuits, two or more bulb are connected by different wires but to the same wire source. They eventually connect also but they are not in a row the way a series circuit is. The resistance is cut in half, voltage remains the same, but the current is added together.

Difficulty:
This unit was probably the hardest unit so far for me. Probably because there was a lot more materials, less blog posts to help me, and a change in teaching styles as Ms. Lawrence left. I found that memorizing all the big problems and having to remember all the different equations in order to solve a problem right was hard for me. 
I overcame these difficulties by staying patient and kept doing my homework everyday. I came into conference period about two or three times to seek help also. The lightbulb clicked just by doing more practice problems, searching a couple of concepts on Google, and asking questions. 


Problem-Solving Skills, Effort, and Learning:
Effort in class: I don't think I was able to contribute in class as I have in the past because this unit was really difficult and I usually learn better by intaking the information first and then giving it back verbally but it took me a while to understand the concepts. Also, there was one time when I had to give myself a 0/3 on homework because I wasn't able to have it completed and that has never happened before.
Homework: I learned a lot from doing the homework problems because in this unit the outside of class assignments were what tied everything together for me. Although I missed one assignment, it happened because I had a lot of work to do. I was even able to complete this blog post even though my computer broke a couple of days ago, so I feel as though I maintained my homework throughout the unit.
Groupwork/Peers: This was a difficult unit to stay focused on because at times it got boring because I didn't understand what was going on but my effort in groupwork was still good and also I learned a lot from Paige and Abby when I didn't understand what was going on. I do think that my learning was affected because there are students in my section who are extremely distracting which caused me a lot of frustration this unit. 

Goals:
For next unit, I plan on doing more research if I do not understand something and also reading the pages in the textbook for support. I stopped going in during my free period to ask questions and talk to my teacher but I might have to start that again depending on how this test goes for me tomorrow.

Connections:
Many of the connections that I saw outside of class were already put into Part A. 

Podcast:
In this unit we did not do podcasts. Sorry!