Interactive Newton's Laws Simulation
Change the force and the mass — watch acceleration respond, live, in front of the class.
Opens a live board in your browser. No install, no hardware.
Drop a feather and a stone in real gravity. Toggle air resistance; switch to Moon gravity.
Students memorize F = ma without ever feeling it. On Boardsy you write the equation by hand, hit Analyze, and it becomes a running simulation the whole class can push on. Turn air resistance off and the feather and the hammer land together — the Apollo-15 moment, on a Chromebook.
45-minute outline
How to teach it
- Warm-up (5 min): ask the class to predict which lands first — a feather or a stone. Take a vote.
- Reveal (10 min): run the drop with air resistance ON, then OFF. Let a student change gravity to the Moon.
- Explore (15 min): students on their own screens change mass and force and describe what happens to acceleration.
- Check (10 min): tap Analyze for the worked F = ma steps, then push a 3-question check to every device.
Standard
NGSS MS-PS2-2
This lesson is built to support NGSS MS-PS2-2 for Grades 6–9. Alignment is a teaching guide, not an official endorsement — check it against your district's pacing.
“My students could change the ramp angle themselves and immediately see why the acceleration changed.”
Teach Interactive Newton's Laws Simulation tomorrow.
Open the live board, invite your class, and start.