Speed Time Graphs

The resource consists of a presentation, two matching exercises and a worksheet. The resource is for KS4 students taking the Higher paper.

The lesson starts by looking at the relationship between change of speed, acceleration and time. Students are shown how to find acceleration from a speed-time graph.

Examples of drawing a distance-time graph from the speed-time graph and of drawing a speed-time graph from a distance-time graph are given. The students then do a matching activity between distance-time and speed-time graphs.

Students are then shown how to find distance traveled from a speed-time graph. The students then do a second matching exercise, in which descriptions of journeys are to be matched with distance-time and speed-time graphs.

Students then answer a worksheet of 6 questions.

The lesson ends with students learning how to use tangents speed-time graph to find the instantaneous acceleration and how to approximate the area under a curved speed-time graph to find distance. Students also consider whether estimates are underestimate or overestimates. There are more questions for students to do.