Roller Coaster Physics

This week we learned about potential and kinetic energy by building roller coasters out of pipe insulation. The children were challenged to find a way to make either a hill or a loop somewhere in their roller coaster. Two groups discovered that to make it work, they needed to start the roller coaster as high as possible to give it enough potential energy and to place the hill close to the start so that the marble has enough kinetic energy to go over the hill or loop.