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Rishi Garg
Pre-Calculus, 5th Period
Mrs. Beck
4 June 2008

Pit and Pendulum Journal

Date Facts Reflections

5/9 • Pendulum is suspended This doesn’t seem like a very

above man (Steve)
• Is descending at a steady
rate
• 12 swings will kill Steve
• One minute to escape
• Unit Question: How long
will it take for the
pendulum to swing 12
times?
5/10 Homework 3
When we were setting up the
experiment to determine what
affects the pendulum’s period,
we had problems:
• Consistency
• Materials
• Timing
tough question to answer… but
I’m sure that we’ll end up doing
a lot of measurements and
comparing our different results.
Also, I wonder: why is Steve in
this situation?
I realized today that it is
impossible to get perfect results
in an experiment. There is
always room for error, like in our
experiment today. Humans can’t
time instances consistently;
there will always be a slight
difference. However, we can
alter the procedure to make less
room for error.

To fix these problems, we could

have:

• Made a clearer, more

precise procedure
• Had string that didn’t
stretch

• Had the same person
timing the whole
experiment
5/12 Measurement variation
happens in all experiments; it’s
impossible to get exactly
consistent results every time.
The results of most
statistics fit a normal
distribution, and are in the
shape of a bell curve. This
curve has the fewest, most
extreme results on the ends,
and the average (mean) of the
results in the middle.
5/14 There are two types of normal
distribution:
• Many instances across a
population
• Same instance, but many
measurements
Categorical data is data that
has been grouped into
categories that are not
numerical. This type of grouping
does not fit a normal
distribution.
5/16 The symbol for the mean of a
set of numbers is x. It is
pronounced: “x-bar”. The
symbol for a data item is xi.
To find the spread of a set of
numbers, we can use the mean
absolute deviation:
t=1nx-xin
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Measurement variation is the
concept I was describing in the
last entry. It’s a very unfortunate
thing but it’s inevitable.
However, we can predict the
range of variations using a bell
curve or normal distribution.
This distribution is really useful
because it applies naturally to
most times when something is
being measured.
Unfortunately for us, we can
never get a perfectly normally
distributed set of data. When we
measure many instances across
a population, we get even less
accurate data, because we
might be leaving some extreme
cases out. I think it’s safer to
measure the same instance
many times.
This was a lot of information. I
tried a variety of different
methods to find the spread of a
data set, and I think standard
deviation is the best one. It’s
good because it uses the
distance of each data item from
the mean. In this way, each data
item is inspected as an

Basically, we have to subtract
each data item from the mean
of the set, and find the mean of
these differences.
To ensure that the
differences are all positive, we
use the standard deviation,
which is symbolized by σ
(sigma):
t=1nx-xi2n
This is very similar to the mean
absolute deviation, except that
we square each of the
differences, and finally take the
square root at the end.
5/20 The standard deviation
measures the spread of the
data. If the data is normally
distributed:
• 68% of results are within 1
standard deviation from
the mean
• 95% of results are within 2
standard deviations from
the mean
If we take many measurements
of the pendulum’s period, they
will most likely fit a normal
distribution.
5/27 Although the standard deviation
is good to use if we are
measuring something that is
contained within our sample, it
won’t work if we are measuring
something that is all over the
world. To make sure we account
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individual, then the results are
combined to show the spread as
a whole. Mean absolute
deviation isn’t as good as
standard deviation because it
can include negative numbers,
which will mess up the end
result. We might even get zero
as a mean absolute deviation,
and that wouldn’t help us very
much. Standard deviation uses
all positive numbers, so we can
even compare σ of one data set
to that of another.
This is very good information to
know, even in the future. Using
this, we can determine what is
“normal” and what is not. For
example, we had that problem
about the uncle’s penny, and we
couldn’t agree on whether it was
counterfeit or not. We can
calculate the standard deviation
of the set of pennies, then see
how many σ away from the
mean the uncle’s penny is. If it’s
more than 2σ away, we can be
fairly sure it is counterfeit. This
logic can be applied to many
other situations.
This is like what I was saying in
one of the earlier entries. If we
measure one instance across a
population, we might miss some
extreme cases, and thereby
draw inaccurate conclusions. It
makes sense to make the

for possible extreme cases
outside of our measurements,
we use the sample standard
deviation, symbolized by S:
t=1nx-xi2n-1
This is very similar to regular
standard deviation, which can
also be called population
standard deviation. The only
difference is that we divide by
one less than the number of
data items, thereby creating a
slightly larger deviation.
5/29 The standard pendulum for the
unit has the following
specifications:
• String is 2 feet long
• Amplitude is 20°
• Bob consists of one
washer
In order to measure the period
of the standard pendulum, we
need to make sure we do the
following things:
• Tie washer, then cut string
• Use a static (non-moving)
base
• Do 30 trials
5/31 Homework 18
My group experimented with
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standard deviation slightly
larger in order to account for
extreme cases. I suppose we
can use population standard
deviation in experiments where
our sample is the entire
population, and we can use
sample standard deviation in
experiments where our sample
is not the entire population. I
wonder, however, just how
much more accurate is sample
standard deviation than
population standard deviation?
Why do we only subtract one
from the number of data items?
What if there are very extreme
cases?
I think this experiment is much
better planned than the first
experiment we conducted. We
now know about measurement
variation, and we tried to lessen
the chances for human error this
time. We tried to keep the
standard pendulum consistent
throughout the three groups
that we had, so that we would
get the same results. We also
did a large number of trials, so
that we could get more accurate
data.
I think that weight definitely
does not affect the period of a
pendulum’s swing. We learned
in Physics that gravity is doing
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changing the weight of the all of the work of swinging the

standard pendulum. Whereas
the standard pendulum has one
washer, we had five washers on
our pendulum. We did about 15
trials of timing 12 periods of the
pendulum swinging.
The Normality Assumption
states that if you make many
measurements of the period of
any given pendulum, the data
will closely fit a normal
distribution, or bell curve. The
standard deviation of our set of
data was very small; it was
around 0.17. It is very close to
the standard deviation of the
pendulum with only one washer.
This means that most of the
data items are not much larger
or smaller than the mean
period, meaning that weight
does not affect the period of a
pendulum.
pendulum, so the weight is
negligible. Although my group
didn’t change other variables,
I’m fairly sure that amplitude
doesn’t matter either. The only
factor that matters is the length
of the string. I know this
because the group that changed
the length had a much different
mean than that of the standard
pendulum.
Conor and I worked really
well together. I think that the
arguments that we had helped
to further our investigation,
because we ended up refining a
lot of our procedure. We split up
the work equally, and we talked
a lot together about the results
of our experimentation.

There were two people in my

group: Conor and me. I’d give
both of us an A grade, because
we made constructive
suggestions, listened to each
other, stayed on task, and
reached a common conclusion.
Although we had occasional
arguments, we settled the
disputes and eventually agreed
with each other.

6/3 I think that there are only a few Finding the relationship will be
more steps to do in order to the hardest part at this point. I

solve the unit problem. Here is
the question once again: How
long will it take for the
pendulum to swing 12 times? In
order to answer this question,
we need to measure the period
of the pendulum with many
different lengths of string. Since
we already did this, we just
need to use that data to
determine a relationship and
predict the period at a length of
30 feet.
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think I can just put all the data
into my calculator and use the
technology to find some
different types of equations:
linear, exponential, power, etc.
Once I have found the right type
of relationship, predicting the
period at 30 feet will be easy; all
I have to do is plug 30 into the
equation. Finally, we’ll need to
measure a real 30-foot-long
pendulum to see how accurate
our prediction is.