Design a beach to analyse waves

Worksheet B

Now that we know some of the theoretical features and characteristics of waves we can start to examine water waves and see how they behave. Waves form a very important part of our understanding of the environment. We can study wave behaviour to see how our beaches and coastlines will be affected. We can also study wave behaviour to understand large tidal waves and Tsunamis.

One way we can start to understand waves is to build a model and then conduct experiments to see how waves behave in our model.

In this activity you will investigate some ideas for designing a model that you can use to experimentally analyse wave behaviour. Your model is to include such features as a 'beach' and 'mini- island' formations.

Use the Internet

1. Use the internet to perform this section of the activity
2. Work in co-operative pairs to perform this task and appoint one person as the time keeper.
3. Allow yourself 10 minutes to find information on wave experiments
4. Access the following website to research for some ideas for designing your wave experiment model:

Experiments to Analyse Wave behaviour

5. Save this wave experiment document to your disk as follows:

Choose Save a copy.. from the File menu
Select OK then Save in the Save a copy.. sub menu

6. Finish your Internet session

3. Your task is to plan and design an experiment that will analyse the features that affect wave behaviour. Your experiment needs to consider the following features:

a. Speed and height of waves
b. Effect of wind on waves
c. Effect of water depth on wave speed and height
d. Effects of ‘islands’ and ‘beaches’ on the features of waves

a. Aim
b. Equipment List
c. Method including reasons and purpose for each test
d. Results with analysis of findings
e. Explanations for discrepancies in results and suggestions for improvements
f. Conclusions