The subject of physics studies the properties and interactions of matter at a “physical” visible level. As of early January, our class has covered the concepts of kinematics, forces, energy / momentum / power, and is now in the middle of rotational motion. Each day the class is given a set of problems from the topic covered during that day as well as notes for the next day’s topic. For almost every major physics chapter, the class is given a special “Über” problem which involves a multiple series of steps that cover most of the topics from that chapter. Although each über problem has the same context and variables, every student is given different values for each variable, making each final answer different for everyone else. . Additionally, for some chapters the class would occasionally perform a lab instead of an über problem. In labs, the class gets split up into groups of three or four and each group performs an experiment based on a topic from that physics chapter and records the results in Microsoft Excel. Below are two pdfs of major physics assignments.

In this über problem, you are assigned to find the final displacement of a hamster after he is launched in a rocket at a certain given angle. This problem requires the utilization of major topics in kinematics including projectile motion in 1-D, constant 1-D motion, and accelerating 1-D motion. For each über problem, you are required to draw a clear diagram with all variables listed, a list of variable values, a summary of your strategy, and the individual steps in solving the problem with all work shown.

In this lab assignment, I along with two other teammates measured the time it took a penny to drop down to the floor from specific heights, 10 trials for each setting. The purpose of this lab was to approximate the value of gravitational acceleration and list what potential inconsistencies might lead to an inaccurate value. In the excel file, our group had to have a table with the times for each setting and two graphs of the average height as a function of time.