A sailboat increases its speed from 1 m/s to 4 m/s in 3 seconds. What will the speed of the sailboat be at 6 seconds if the acceleration stays the same?

Answer 1

If the acceleration is constant, it means that the rate at which the boat is gaining speed remains the same.

The boat gains 3 m/s (from 1 m/s to 4 m/s) in 3 seconds. If you give it another 3 seconds, it will again gain the same amount of speed, 3 m/s. So it will speed up from 4 m/s to 7 m/s. So at 6 seconds, the speed is 7 m/s.

In other words, because the boat gains 3 m/s in three seconds, it gains 1 m/s every second. Its acceleration is "1 meter per second per second", or 1 m/s^2.

I hope this helps! :-)