Question

You drop a ball. Describe what happens to each of the following as the ball falls downward. Do they increase, decrease or stay the same?

1) its kinetic energy
2) its potential energy
3) its total energy

Answer 1

i have to reformat my answers unfortunately due to the accusations of a few things so this is going to be half-baked****

1 - kinetic energy increases

when the ball falls, the speed obviously would increase gradually.

think about it, kinetic energy is proportional to the SQUARE of the object's velocity. So it leaves us at this, velocity increase --> KE increase. simple.

2 - potential energy decreases

due to the ball moving closer to the earth's surface, the PE will decrease (it's literally the reference point for the potential energy). so when the ball falls, it is just losing height and distance from the earth's surface which brings us to this conclusion, it's not hard to visualize really. all that energy due to it being in motion and accelerating is transferred to kinetic energy (abbreviated as KE)

3 - total energy stays constant

im assuming you must have taken some class that involved the basic fundamentals of physics ---> in a closed system, energy is CONSERVED. apply it to this scenario, as the ball falls, the total energy stays the same, by the way, note that the the total energy is sum of KE and PE (kinetic/potential energy). as potential energy decreases, kinetic energy increases (it is no longer stationary and is accelerating meaning motion). with all this, the total energy remains CONSTANT (keep this in mind!!!, dont forget!). hence the total energy of both kinetic and potential is equal to the initial total energy of the ball when it was released or wherever it began its fall.

thanks.

Answer 2

It’s potential energy is transferred into kinetic energy, which then continues to increase as a gains momentum, until it finally collides with a surface.