Measuring Your Center of Gravity

Noa Smudde, Ryan Watterson, Hannah Destefano, Zuri Bryant & Alice Lin
Washington Latin Public Charter School
5200 2nd St NW, Washington, DC 20011

INTRODUCTION: PROCEDURE & SETUP: DATA AND ANALYSIS:

Our hypothesis was that people whose bottom Figure 1: Measuring distance from wall
(around the widest part) was smaller than 94 cm This is us measuring the
would be able to touch their toes with their heels distance of the heels of this
closer to the wall, and those with a bottom larger student’s feet from the
than 99 cm would be farther, and all bottom base of the wall as they
sizes in between would have a distance in bend over, in order to
between the former and the latter. By creating measure how high or low
this poster, we are communicating within a her certain of gravity is. We
scientific framework. We used our problem determined that people
solving skills by evaluating how best to who could stand closer to
eradicate any possible margins for error, and we the wall when touching
identified those potential errs by analyzing our their toes had a lower
data and finding out where those Although the whiskers are quite small, they show the standard deviation in
center of gravity.
indiscrepancies lay. It was through this analysis our trends, with the small SD being 0.02848587613, medium SD
and problem solving that we created a mostly 0.2616941562, and large SD 0.280802676. As shown in the graph, the
smaller the butt, the smaller that person’s distance from the wall. This
error-free investigation. We used
Figure 2: Measuring the bottom brings us to the conclusion that having a smaller bottom means that you
mathematical thinking to calculate conversions have a lower center of gravity. There were ≈ 10 people in each set.
and figure out ratios (flexibility, etc). We are measuring
around the widest part of
OBJECTIVE: this student’s bottom, CONCLUSION:
The objective of this lab was to find out which making sure to record We reached the conclusion that the size of your bottom does affect your
variables (attributes) of a high school freshman the length we found in center of gravity. If one’s bottom (around the widest part) is smaller
determine where their center of gravity lies. centimeters. We made than 94 cm, they would be able to touch their toes with their heels
sure every student closer to the wall, and would therefore have a lower center of gravity.
MATERIALS USED: followed the same
We met several course domains, including communicating within a
- Measuring tape (in cm) scientific framework, problem solving skills, analyzing data, creating
guidelines for taking this investigations, and using computational thinking.
- Measuring stick (meter stick)
- All students in Honors Conceptual Physics 2022-23 measurement to
- Google sheets (and calculators) eliminate any incongruity
-Scale (measured in pounds and converted to kg in our data.
- Vertical wall (90 degrees from floor)