Pulley & Mechanical-Advantage Simulation
Add a pulley, feel the force needed drop — the trade between force and distance made visible.
Opens a live board in your browser. No install, no hardware.
A block on a ramp: change the angle, friction and mass and watch what actually moves.
Mechanical advantage is one of those ideas that lands the moment students can pull the rope themselves. Boardsy turns your sketch of a pulley system into an interactive model where the force-vs-distance trade is something the class changes and measures, not something they copy off a slide.
45-minute outline
How to teach it
- Hook (5 min): ask why a single fixed pulley makes lifting feel easier — collect guesses.
- Model (10 min): sketch the system on the board; Boardsy renders the forces.
- Explore (15 min): add pulleys and watch required force halve while the rope you pull doubles.
- Formalize (10 min): Analyze writes out mechanical advantage; push a quick check to students.
Standard
NGSS MS-PS2
This lesson is built to support NGSS MS-PS2 for Grades 6–9. Alignment is a teaching guide, not an official endorsement — check it against your district's pacing.
“Rope, force, distance — they finally connected because they were the ones moving the slider.”
Teach Pulley & Mechanical-Advantage Simulation tomorrow.
Open the live board, invite your class, and start.