Physics& 121 — General Physics I

Important dates Fri, Jan 9 - Last day to drop with 100% refund Mon, Jan 19- No class: MLK Day Fri, Jan 23 - Last day to drop with 50% refund Mon, Feb 16 - No class: Presidents Day Thu, Mar 19 - Final exam 12:00-1:50pm

Instructor Information

• Office: Whitehorse 216
• Office hours: Tues, Wed & Thurs 10am-noon
• Office phone: 425-388-9431
• Cell phone: 206-523-6254 (I reserve the right to not answer ;-)
• Official email: kwashburn@everettcc.edu
• Preferred email: kcwashburn@gmail.com

Course Information

• Lecture: Thursdays 1-2:50pm, Whitehorse 248
• Lab: Tue&Fri 1-2:50pm (Sec A), Mon&Wed 1-2:50pm (Sec B), Whitehorse 250
• Course website: http://faculty.everettcc.edu/home/kwashburn/phys121
• Pre-requisites: ENGL 098 with a C or higher, MATH 138 or MATH& 142 or MATH& 144 or equivalent; or concurrent enrollment in MATH 138 or MATH& 142. Do not take this course if you do not meet the pre-requisites.
• Catalog course description: (NS-L) Motion, force, momentum and energy are studied. (Formerly PHYS 117)
• Instructor course description: Physics is the study of how the world works. The best way to learn how the world works is to observe it carefully and develop models that include verbal, graphical and mathematical descriptions of the particular physical phenomena. Because we invent physics by closely observing nature, the main emphasis of this course will be the laboratory. You will use your own measurements and observations to construct models that describe the ideas of motion, force, momentumm and energy.

Textbook

• Knight, Jones and Field, College Physics: A Strategic Approach, 1^st ed. (2006)
  
• Mastering Physics online homework system
  NOTE: If you purchase a new copy of Knight it will automatically come bundled with an access code for Mastering Physics, the online homework system used in this course. If you buy your book used or unbundled, you will have to purchase the Mastering Physics access code separately from the website for $44.50.
  
• Sokoloff, Thornton and Laws, Realtime Physics Module 1, 2^nd ed. (2004) — DO NOT BUY A USED COPY OF THIS WORKBOOK!

Course Goals

The goals of this course are

• to understand important concepts in physics--specifically this quarter: motion, force, energy and momentum;
• to learn problem solving in physics.

Course Objectives

Objectives are the smaller, assessable steps towards the larger goals. By the end of this course, you should be able to

• use Newton's Laws of Motion and rules of kinematics to describe the relations among forces on and motions of an object;
• use mathematical, verbal and graphical descriptions of the forces on and motions of a system to predict the future behavior of the system;
• make simplifying assumptions, approximations and estimations to describe physical systems and estimate solutions to problems describing the physical world;
• apply the conservation of mechanical energy and linear momentum to describe and predict the behavior of physical systems.

These objectives will be achieved through the hands-on laboratory exercises, homework, and lecture activities.

A	94%
A-	90%
B+	86%
B	82%
B-	78%
C+	74%
C	70%
C-	66%
D+	62%
D	58%
D-	54%
E	0-54%

Item	Number	Points Each	Points Total
Pre-labs	11	5	55
Labs & Lab Homework	11	20	220
Online Homework	8	10	80
Participation	8	5	40
Midterms	2	100	200
Final	—	200	200
Total			795

Grades

The numbers in the table of grades are all lower cutoffs for the corresponding letter grades. If you are taking this class on a S/NS basis, the cutoff for an 'S' is 70%.

Here are some of the things I look for when grading:

Did you understand the physical principles involved?

Did you use the appropriate equations, numbers and units?

Are all parts of your answer consistent and correct?

Does your answer make physical sense?

Are your explanations communicated clearly? Though this is not a writing class, good communication skills are important no matter what you do in your life. Poor grammar and spelling and illegibility may also count against you.

I award partial credit when grading if your work is clear enough for me to interpret and your answers are consistent within a given problem.

Grades will be kept up to date on the course's Blackboard site throughout the quarter. If you do not know how to access Blackboard to check your grades, please feel free to inquire about grades during lab time.

Labs, Pre-labs and Lab Homework

This course is largely lab-based. There will be 11 labs this quarter. Pre-labs are due before you can start a lab. Labs and lab homeworks can be done at your own pace within the due dates specified below. There are 11 labs and only 10 weeks in the quarter, so you should go faster than just 1 lab each week. When you finish one lab, go right onto the next. The labs are meant to be a hands-on way for you to understand physics in both qualitative and quantitative ways. Take the time to understand what you are doing every step of the way, to connect concepts from lecture with lab activities, to write clear answers to lab questions, and to make sure your results always make physical sense. This portion of the class is worth about 35% of your overall grade so it is worthwhile to do a good job with it.

Online Homework

The best way to learn problem-solving is to practice. To this end, a portion of your homework each week will be in the form of Mastering Physics, the online homework system that came with your textbook. If you bought your textbook used you can purchase online access at the Mastering Physics website. The greatest benefits to using online homework are that 1-you get immediate feedback about whether or not you've solved a problem correctly and 2-you are forced to solve a problem until you have the right answer; there is no partial credit for wrong answers. Start your homework early in case you get stuck!

To get started, go to the Mastering Physics website, www.masteringphysics.com, choose our textbook, and enter the information listed below:

Course ID: MPWASHBURN51386
Student ID: last four digits of your EVCC student number

Once you have completed this step you should see a list of assignments. Online homework is due at 11:59pm on Wednesday nights. Online problems will be graded according to the following rules.

• Each question is worth 1-2 points
• You have 20 chances to answer each question correctly (except for multiple choice)
• You get partial credit for correctly answering subparts of questions or questions in a "Hint" right, even if you aren't able to obtain the answer to the main part.
• If the question is multiple choice, you will lose 1/(n-1) points, where n is the number of options to choose from, for each wrong answer you submit.
• If you miss a multiple choice question in a "Hint" that will also count against your score.

I encourage you to work on all homework as groups; however, you should know that the numerical values for any online problem are assigned randomly by the computer; so the answer to your problem will not be the same as other students. When answering qualitative questions, make sure your answers are your own words. Answers that are identical to those of other students will get a zero. All homework decreases linearly in point value from the time it's due to 48 hours after. For example, homework that is 1 hour late will lose 1/48 (roughly 2%) of the possible points earned.

Participation

Watching the instructor work out example problems on the board does not necessarily teach you how to solve problems. To get more practice with problem solving, we will often have group quizzes or other activities. These are meant to get you practicing problem solving during class. There is no way to makeup participation points.

Exams

There will be two midterms and one final exam. The midterms will largely cover recent material but the final is cumulative. You should bring a calculator. There are no notes or books allowed during exams but a formula sheet will be provided. If you are planning to miss any of the exams let the instructor know during the first week of the class.

There will not be review sessions before the exams. If you have questions while you're studying I encourage you to ask them during class or come to office hours.

Policies

GROUP WORK

I encourage you to work in groups and discuss results. The ability to work well in a group is an important skill. In this class you are encouraged to work in small groups on all assignments both in class and outside of class. You must work in pairs on labs. More specifically, you are encouraged to discuss methods, graphs, results, and hypotheses. But you must still do all your own work.

CHEATING

Cheating will not be tolerated. All work you turn in must be yours - all the words, all the calculations, all the thinking. If your work looks too similar to someone else's or too closely resembles something published on paper or online I will suspect cheating and investigate it fully in accordance with the college's policies on cheating. The college's sanctions for cheating include suspension and/or expulsion from the college.

LATE WORK and MISSED EXAMS

There are no make-ups for quizzes or other in-class activities. The total points the homework is worth (both online and lab) decreases to zero over the course of 48 hours after the due date and time. I will "time stamp" late assignments when I get them and deduct points accordingly. You may not submit lab homework electronically. Missed exams can be taken 1-2 days in advance if a valid excuse is provided within the first week of class.

Course Schedule

IN LAB	IN LECTURE
1/5, 1/6 Syllabus, FCI, Units 1/7, 1/9 *Prelab 1 due Work on Lab 1 In Lab 1 do exts 2-3 and 3-3	1/8 Vectors, 1-D Motion (position, velocity, acceleration) Read Ch 1, 2 & 3 (sections 3.1-3.4 only) *Online HW 1 due Wednesday 1/14 at 11:59pm
Finish Lab 1 and start Lab 2 In Lab 2 do exts 2-3 and 3-5 but skip ext 3-3 *Lab 1 and Prelab 2 due by Friday	1/15 Force: Newton's 1st and 2nd Laws, Free-body Diagrams Read Ch 4 & 5 *Online HW 2 due Wednesday 1/21 at 11:59pm
1/19 -- No school: MLK Day Finish Lab 2 and start Lab 3 In Lab 3 skip exts 1-3 and 2-4 In the Lab 3 homework skip question 6 *Lab 2 and Prelab 3 due by Friday	1/22 More Force: Statics and Dynamics, 2-D force problems Read Ch 4 & 5 *Online HW 3 due Wednesday 1/28 at 11:59pm
Finish Lab 3 and start Lab 4 In Lab 4 do exts 1-3 and 3-2 *Lab 3 and Prelab 4 due by Friday	1/29 Newton's 3rd Law Re-read Ch 4, section 4.8 *Online HW 4 due Wednesday 2/4 at 11:59pm
Finish Lab 4 and start Lab 5 In Lab 5 skip exts 1-3 and 1-5 *Lab 4 and Prelab 5 due by Friday	2/5 First Exam: Ch 1-5; Labs 1-4
Finish Labs 5 & 6 and start Lab 7 In Lab 6 do exts 1-4 and 1-6 In Lab 7 do exts 1-2, 1-3 and 3-3 *Labs 5 & 6 and Prelabs 6 & 7 due by Friday	2/12 Impulse & Momentum Read Ch 9 *Online HW 5 due Wednesday 2/18 at 11:59pm
Finish Lab 7 and start Lab 8 In Lab 8 Activity 1-2, you will bounce clay and rubber balls off the force probe instead of dropping it Skip ext 2-3 but do ext 2-4 *Lab 7 and Prelab 8 due by Friday	2/19 2-D Momentum, Work and Energy Read Ch 10 *Online HW 6 due Wednesday 2/25 at 11:59pm
Finish Lab 8 and start Lab 9 In Lab 9 do ext 1-2 but skip exts 1-4 and 2-2 *Lab 8 and Prelab 9 due by Friday	2/26 Work and Energy Read Ch 10 *Online HW 7 due Wednesday 3/4 at 11:59pm
Finish Labs 9 & 11 and start Lab 12 Skip Lab 10 In Lab 11 do exts 1-3 and 2-2 In Lab 12 do exts 1-4 and 2-3 *Labs 9 & 11 and Prelabs 11 & 12 due by Friday	3/5 Second Exam: Ch 1-5, 9, 10; Labs 1-9
Finish Lab 12 *Lab 12 due by Friday	3/12 Projectile Motion Read Ch 3, sections 3.6 & 3.7 *Online HW 8 due MONDAY 3/16 at 11:59pm
3/19 Final Exam: Thursday, March 19 12:00-1:50pm Ch 1-5, 9, 10; Labs 1-9, 11, 12

Caveat

All information in this syllabus is subject to change by the instructor.

Resources

• EvCC Tutoring center - free tutoring for physics!
• EvCC Writing center - free writing help!
• HyperPhysics Concepts - a detailed concept map of all major concepts in physics and astronomy
• Physics Education Technology - A website that contains many interactive simulations to help you understand physics