Hovercraft!

Today, we did a lab involving a hovercraft and we learned about Inertia.

1. Riding on a hovercraft feels like you are gliding on a balloon. It felt like this because the bottom was full of air and the hovercraft was gliding on the floor. If someone hadn't tried this before, I would tell them that it was fun and that they should expect to feel like they were floating on air. Riding on a sled, skateboard, etc. was different than riding on this hovercraft because the hovercraft does not stop unless someone else stops it for you. A skateboard or sled would stop after a while. Also, something other than a hovercraft would have increasing velocity the whole time, while a hovercraft accelerates and then maintains a constant velocity. 
2. I learned that inertia was another way to speak about Isaac Newton's first law which is: an object in motion stays in motion and an object at rest stays at rest unless it is acted upon by an outside force. I learned that net force was combination of all the forces that act on a specific object. We also learned about equilibrium which is basically when an object has a net force of zero which is in a balanced state.
3. Based on this lab, acceleration seems to depend on net force and the movement of the object. 
4. Based on this lab, I would expect to have a constant velocity when there is a constant force and no acceleration. 
5. Some members who participated in this lab were harder to stop than others because of their body mass. Because of how fast the hovercraft was moving and how heavy the person was, it made it more difficult for the hovercraft to stop.