Physics

The Physics text is //Active Physics: a Project-based Inquiry Approach// (3rd ed.) by Arthur Eisenkraft and published by It's About Time.

- Be here on time every day and be an active part of class – Participation points are earned daily - You will be assigned to groups/teams of three to five students. - Your notebook is a college ruled, sewn binding composition book. Do not tear pages out of this notebook as it is a record of your scientific inquiry.  - Please write on both the left and right sides of the pages. - Notebooks will be graded; organization/neatness counts - Should you need one, a second notebook is up to you to acquire - This is a fairly fast-paced course so daily attendance will make this course much easier to accomplish.
 * Groups will last as long as we are working on a chapter and will then be changed for the next chapter.
 * You must work with your group and cannot leave the group to join another or to work solo.
 * All individuals in the group must have complete notebooks
 * Group members will evaluate team mates’ performances – including their own.

This physics class is based in learning from the activities performed as well as readings and writings related to the activities. Making up missed activities will be difficult and often impossible to do at home. Taking good notes and encouraging your team mates to do the same will help ensure your best learning results. It will also help you catch up more quickly should you miss a day of class.

Each chapter will have a Chapter Challenge which will be done as a team. These teams remain together throughout the entire chapter and will be changed for the next chapter. Part way through the chapter there will be a mini-challenge which will help you work towards the final challenge. It is up to the team how your challenge project will be completed, but it must cover all the requirements set forth by the Chapter Challenge. Chapter Challenge presentations will be the last class day before the chapter test.

There are multiple ways to submit your challenge and mini-challenge documents:
 * Hard copy to me (posters, models, etc.)
 * E-mail michaelmelosh@gmail.com (Please acquire a Gmail e-mail address. DPS often blocks e-mails from Yahoo! accounts.)

The assigned problems from Physics to Go can be found here: Physics Problems.


 * Physics Progression || Topics by Chapter || Physics Problems ||
 * Semester 1 Chapters

. 1 Driving the roads

2 Physics in Action

. 3 Safety

4 Thrills and Chills ||. . . . 1 Reaction time, errors/accuracy/precision, speed/velocity, vector/scalar, acceleration, force, centripetal force

2 Newton's three laws, inertia, mass, gravity, weight, free-body diagrams, trajectory of a projectile, range of a projectile, friction, kinetic energy (KE), gravitational potential energy (GPE), Law of conservation of energy, work, energy conversion, normal force

3 Newton's three laws, pressure, work-energy theorem, momentum, impulse

4 Velocity, acceleration, acceleration due to gravity, GPE, KE, conservation of energy, stoichiometry, spring potential energy, inverse square relationships, Earth's gravitational field, Newton's second law, weight versus mass, apparent weight, centripetal force, centripetal acceleration, net force, normal force, work, power, measuring uncertainty, vector addition . || Lesson Objectives

Class Notes

Work Exemplars

Graph Exemplar

[|Physics Notebook] [|Rubric] || .
 * Semester 2 Chapters

5 Let Us Entertain You

. ..

6 Electricity for Everyone

. ..

7 Toys for Understanding

. 8 Atoms on Display ||. . . 5 Sound and vibration, tension, pitch, frequency, string vibration, wave, medium, wave parts, longitudinal/compression waves, transverse waves, standing and periodic waves, wave speed, direct and inverse relationships, diffraction, law of reflection, angle of incidence, normal, angle of reflection, focal point, focal length, real image, virtual image, refraction, Snell's law, critical angle, subtractive color mixing, shadow formation

6 Electricity, generator, closed circuit, electric charge (coulomb), electric current, electric energy, resistance, voltage, series and parallel circuits, circuit symbols, fundamental charges, voltmeter, ammeter, power, load limit, switches, equations for voltage/current/resistance/power, heat transfer, temperature, specific heat, laws of thermodynamics: zeroth/first/second, entropy, heat engines, efficiency, convection, conduction, radiation

7 Magnetic fields, interaction between magnetic fields and electric current, electromagnets, solenoids, magnetic domains, galvanometers, generators, energy conversion

8 Electric fields, charge, conservation of charge, Coulomb's law, grounding, induction, quantization of charge, charge of the electron, Millikan experiment, interference of waves, photoelectric effect, work function, photons, Schroedinger wave equation, DeBroglie waves, proton-neutron model, strong force, Feynman diagram, action at a distance, radioactive decay, half-life, atomic mass, atomic number ||  || 9 Sports on the Moon || 9 ||  ||
 * Honors