Gummi bears

Today at math team, no one brought real food, besides a bag of grapes :[

Instead, we had two large containers of gummi bears, some sour strawberry belts, a bag of cookies, and oreos.

Woo-kie!  Woo-kie!

After finishing his worksheets, one of the seamen decided to entertain himself by bouncing a gummi bear on his paper plate.  First, the gummi bear rested on the plate, while he applied an upward force on the gummi bear by quickly moving the plate up.  This upward force is greater than the weight of the gummi bear.  As the gummi bear leaves the plate, it travels in a parabolic path.

(Yeah, projectile motion and force are old topics… let’s just pretend I’m reviewing for the AP exam XP)

Later, the gummi bear lands on the plate, and when he caught it, he sort of cushioned its landing, but also applied upward force on it again. The gummi bear experiences a change in momentum, which is impulse.  In the collision between the bear and the plate, momentum is conserved.

I don’t have a picture, so here’s a Paint picture.  It’s been a while, so my (originally few) skills are a bit rusty >_<

In reality, the gummi bear does not  travel in an s-shaped path.  Also, you can’t really tell, but he has a face.

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