A bus leaves a stop and a cyclist brakes. Their speed changes all the time. Acceleration is the number that tells us how quickly the speed changes. Then we draw the motion on a graph, and we learn to read the graph like a map.
3 lessons, about 1 h3 simulations13 problems6 practice questionsPython in every lesson
Created by StemPy LabAcceleration tells us how quickly the velocity changes.
A distance-time graph has time on the horizontal axis and distance on the vertical axis. A flat line means rest, a straight sloping line means steady speed, a steeper line means a higher speed, and a line that curves upward means speeding up. The slope of the line is the speed.
A velocity-time graph has time on the horizontal axis and velocity on the vertical axis. A flat line means steady velocity and zero acceleration, a sloping straight line means steady acceleration, and the slope is the acceleration. The area between the line and the time axis is the distance travelled.
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