Physics of a Hold and Spin by Danielle McNerney

Over Thanksgiving break, my family and I went on a walk in the park. I came across the Hold-N-Spins on the playground and tried to think of how it could connect to what we have learned in class. The Hold-N-Spin is essentially a combination of a merry-go-round and monkey bars into one piece of equipment. It works by having you hold onto the bar and start running until you are ready to lift your feet off the ground. The Hold-N-Spin umbrella is on a slant which connects to our energy unit in class. At the top of the umbrella, the kid would have more potential energy and move at a slower angular velocity. As the kid is moving "uphill", he/she has a deceleration of 9.8 m/s because of gravity. Additionally, as the kid is moving "downhill", the potential energy transfers to kinetic energy, and the kid will start to move at a higher angular velocity because it will accelerate at 9.8 m/s. This makes the Hold-N-Spin more fun because of the changing speeds.