Mississippi Science PHS.5.1

ScienceGrades 9–12Physical Science

The Standard

PHS.5: Students will analyze the scientific principles of motion, force, and work.

Research the scientific contributions of Newton and use models to communicate Newton’s principles.

2026 Mississippi College- and Career-Readiness Standards for Science · Newton’s Laws of Motion

Teacher's field guide

What Students Need to Do: Students use sources to learn about Newton’s work on motion, gravity, and light. They build or draw models to explain his three laws of motion.
What Mastery Looks Like: Students can describe a contribution beyond the laws of motion and cite where they learned about it. Their labeled models explain inertia, acceleration under a net force, and forces on two interacting objects.
Common Misconceptions: Students may say Newton discovered gravity rather than described how it acts. They may think moving objects need a constant push, or that action and reaction forces cancel on one object.
How to Assess It: On an exit ticket, sketch a balloon rocket and label how the balloon pushes air backward and the air pushes the balloon forward. Name one other Newton contribution from a source you read.

Lesson moves

Set a toy figure on a cart, roll the cart into a book, and sketch the figure’s path after the cart stops.
Read a textbook paragraph and a museum page on Newton’s prism experiment, then write what he learned and cite both sources.
Match sketches of a stopping bus, an accelerating cart, and a balloon rocket to Newton’s three laws, then explain each match.
Use a seat belt photo to draw what happens to a passenger when a car stops suddenly, and label the belt’s force.

Free download

A ready-to-print activity worksheet aligned to PHS.5.1, with an answer key for the teacher on its own page. No account needed.

PDF, US Letter, prints cleanly in black and white.

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