Energy 14. Investigating Mass and Energy

One of the questions that came up during the Newton's Cradle investigation was whether heavier objects have more energy if they are moving at the same speed as lighter objects.  (We talked about how mass is how much matter an object has in it and that heavier objects have more mass.)  

So, today we investigated the relationship between the mass of a moving object and its energy. First, we weighed two balls.

Then, we released each ball on the Hot Wheels track. The ball hit a car parked in the same spot each time. We measured the distance that the car moved after the collision. We repeated the investigation with each ball five times.

They recorded all of the data, averaged the distances, and graphed the data.

The heavier ball moved the car much farther!  Moving objects with greater mass definitely have more energy!