Physics is taught by Mrs. Chase. Students in this course explore topics such as kinematics, forces, energy, circular motion, and electromagnetism in line with the AP Physics 1 and C curriculums. Students also design and conduct their own lab investigations to answer conceptual questions.
As part of our unit on forces, we were asked to come up with an essential question, conduct experiments to answer it, and summarize our findings in a one-page report. I chose to investigate whether the coefficient of friction is affected by the mass weighing down on the surface, which surprisingly has no effect! Importantly, this assignment also taught me how to communicate my results succinctly, which is an important skill across all disciplines.
After our unit on forces, we completed an investigation on the impulse-momentum theorem and elastic collisions. This theorem states that the change in momentum on an object is equal to its impulse, which we found to be true for several trials. For the elastic collisions, we were asked to investigate if energy and momentum are conserved, which we found to be true in both cases. Lastly, we were asked to find a new feature in the Vernier Software which we have been using for physics modeling.