Gist: Plot against and the whole motion becomes one curve. Height is where the object is; steepness is how fast it is going.

Position against time, redrawn from lecture 2 p.2xt0xt₃xt₄xt₂xt₁ = xt₅t1t2t3t4t5

Schematic, redrawn from p.2 — the PDF is the authority on the exact shape.

Why it matters: It turns velocity into something you can see — the slope of the tangent at time . Rising curve, positive velocity; flat, zero; falling, negative. The five sampled times are the ones average velocity is worked through on p.1, and the ordering is what makes those cases come out: .

Detail: Lecture 2, p.2

Related: Instantaneous velocity, Average velocity, Physics