Dear Physics 606 Students,
Welcome to How Things Work II. This is a course in conceptual physics
that focuses on objects that involve electricity, magnetism, light, radiation,
and nuclear energy. This will be the first time we have taught this course
using CDS instead of videotapes. The demonstrator and lecturer is Professor
Lou Bloomfield who has originated and developed the courses How Things Work
I and II at UVa. The lectures on the CDS are not rehearsed, but are edited
versions of live lectures given at UVa. Assignments and administrative
information related to the undergraduate course have been edited from the
CDS. Most of the several hundred students in the class take it as an elective
to fullfill a science requirement. Although the class that is taped is an
undergraduate class, you will still find the lectures and demos interesting
and stimulating. Our purpose in making this course available to teachers
is to provide you with a myriad of physics examples of “How Things Work”
in everyday life and demos that you can use in your classroom as a teacher.
This is an excellent way to motivate young people to learn about science.
Some of you may find the level of physics discussion in the classroom on
the CDS too rudimentary. However, you may find the multiple-choice exams
more challenging as well as arriving at the correct explanations for the
essay questions for the case studies that I assign for homework. Dr. Bloomfield
starts most of his lectures with a question and proceeds to discuss the physics
surrounding the question. From the discussion of specific applications we
arrive at the general physics principles. The case studies assigned for homework
are quite informative and provide an excellent way to study and learn physics
concepts. You may also obtain information on how to build any of the demos
you see in this course. For example, see the website http://howthingswork.virginia.edu/demonstrations.html#skating.
The CDS will be sent UPS September 15 to the address on your registration
form. It is expected that you will receive the tapes by September 22.
If the CDS are late by a few days, you will have plenty of time to catch
up before the first problem set is due. Please RSVP via email when you have
received the CDS.
On Sept 15 after I get confirmation from the School of Continuing and
Professional Studies that you have registered, I will set up a user name
and password on WebAssign for you. I will notify you by email and you will
be able to log on to WebAssign. You then should learn how to submit homework
and take exams on WebAssign.
The recommended text is the second edition of How Things Work. the second
edition the chapter on water steam and ice is on the website and not in the
book. You will need access to the website material, which is located at
http://rabi.phys.virginia.edu/HTW/book.html. Note that in the table of contents
you can click on the blue type, which is the material not in the book, and
it will come up on the website. This material is actually contained in the
longer first edition. If you have the first edition, you really don’t need
the second edition of the book, since all problems are rewritten on WebAssign.
Please click on the other links and learn more about the details of this
course.