Oak Grove Middle School

Concord, California

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Oak Grove Middle School Science Class

Animal Experiments on Jumping

with Professor Full

Hypothesis: Grasshoppers must take-off at speeds faster than animals can run.

A. How fast does a grasshopper take-off?

It just depends on gravity how far they go and the angle at take-off. Lets say they use the angle which makes them go the farthest (45 degrees).

Measure the total length of one jump in centimeters (cm) with a ruler.Take-off speed (cm/sec) = square root [Total length of jump (cm) X 980 (cm/sec2)]

We studied how the grasshopper jumps and measured how far it jumped. The grasshopper is taking off.......................................

B. Our questions:

1. When your animal moves forward which parts move?


2. When an animal moves forward which parts push?
How do these parts push the animal forward?
How do these parts push the animal upward?


3. When an animal moves what slows down its movement?
Describe how parts of the animal may slow it down less because of their shape or form.

 There it goes! WOW! Its the blur by Professor Full's elbow. It jumped 157 cm, over 5 feet! Its take-off speed was 4 m/sec!!! Professor Full said he discovered the fastest running insect and it can only go 1.5 m/sec. The cockroach measured by the running team only went 0.2 m/sec : )
This is the jumping group giving their presentation on grasshoppers. The grasshopper made a great jump during their presentation!  
   
   

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Last updated 6/23/99