Grade 10 · CAPS

Grade 10 Motion in One Dimension

Physical Sciences practice questions and a worked example

Grade 10 motion in one dimension covers displacement, velocity and acceleration along a straight line. The questions here ask you to define these terms, calculate average speed and average velocity, read position-time and velocity-time graphs, use the equations of motion to find times and distances, and work out stopping and safe following distances. They come from the DBE Grade 10 common Paper 1 for November 2016, 2017 and 2018, each with the answer from the marking guideline.

Worked example

An impatient businessman paces up and down while making a business call on his cellphone. He starts at his desk and walks 5 m east (from A to B) and then walks 7 m west (from B to C). This process takes him 20 s. 2.2 What is the businessman's change in position at C relative to A? 2.3 Calculate the total distance the man covers. 2.4 Explain why the value calculated in QUESTION 2.2 differs from the one calculated in QUESTION 2.3.

Answer

For the total distance, the whole path length travelled is considered. For the change in position, only the original position and the final position of the man are considered.

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Motion in One Dimension

Question 1 of 3

1.1 Which ONE of the following physical quantities is a vector?
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More practice questions

Explore additional Grade 10 Motion in One Dimension questions.

  • 2
    1.7 Which ONE of the vector diagrams below will result in the largest resultant vector?
  • 3
    An impatient businessman paces up and down while making a business call on his cellphone. He starts at his desk and walks 5 m east (from A to B) and then walks 7 m west (from B to C). This process takes him 20 s. 2.2 What is the businessman's change in position at C relative to A?
  • 4
    An impatient businessman paces up and down while making a business call on his cellphone. He starts at his desk and walks 5 m east (from A to B) and then walks 7 m west (from B to C). This process takes him 20 s. 2.3 Calculate the total distance the man covers.
  • 5
    2.5 Define the term velocity.

Common mistakes

  • Mixing up distance and displacement. Distance is the total path length; displacement is the change in position and has a direction.
  • Leaving out the direction. Velocity, displacement and acceleration are vectors, so a full answer gives a direction, for example "0,17 m·s⁻¹ west".
  • Forgetting to convert km·h⁻¹ to m·s⁻¹ before using an equation of motion. Divide by 3,6.

More Grade 10 Physical Sciences topics

Aligned to CAPS Grade 10 Physical Sciences — Motion in One Dimension. Curriculum source: CAPS for the FET Phase, Department of Basic Education.

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