Year 13 Physics students completed a series of experiments to experience the conservation of angular momentum.

Moving our arms out when spinning without friction like an ice skater slows down the spinning rate and bringing the arms together speeds it up because of changes to our rotational inertia (our resistance to spinning motion). It is larger when our arms are out and smaller when they are brought in.

The angular momentum of the spinning wheel must be cancelled out by some opposite angular momentum from the student on the chair who starts spinning when the wheel is horizontal, stops when it is vertical and spins the other way when the wheel is held horizontally in the opposite direction.