Forces: Particle on a Smooth Slope

This is an interactive Geogebra page. It can be used it for teaching CAIE Mechanics (M1) Newton’s Laws of Motion.

You can run this page in a browser by clicking here or you can download the file if you want to. Geogebra pages can easily be embedded into other web-sites, including Firefly.

You can click-and-drag the blue spot to tilt the slope more or less.
You can click-and-drag the green spot to change the P force’s size and direction, or hide it over the particle.

A slider controls the mass of the particle and there are check-boxes for various options. I hope the controls are fairly self-explanatory, but get in touch with me if you have a suggestion.

A common mistake students make is to not consider the perpendicular components of extra force when calculating the normal reaction R force.

I plan to use it to set up questions with a particle-on-horizontal-surface and a particle-on-slope situation, with the P force either not included, horizontal, vertical, parallel or perpendicular to the slope or at some random angle.
I’ll describe the arrangement of the forces, use the tool to draw most of the forces on the projector, perhaps hiding the P force, but describing it. Then ask students to find the magnitude of R, the acceleration of the particle.