Spinning Ghosts Experiment

Today our class conducted a Halloween science experiment! We looked at four different ghosts – one with a paperclip at the bottom and their arms up, one with no paperclip and it's arms up, one with no paperclip and both arms pointed forward and finally one with a paperclip at the bottom and one arm pointed forward and one arm pointed backward.

We then created a graph of which one we thought would spin if we dropped it from a high point.

We discovered that the ghost with a paperclip at the bottom and both arms pointed in different directions created a spinning ghost! We discussed how the paperclip made the bottom of the ghost heavy and therefore pulled it straight down and the arms going in both directions worked like the propellers of a helicopter!