<p>Hey everyone,</p>
<p>I didn't see a thread for AP Physics yet, so I made a thread.
Anyways, I'm a rising sophomore, taking AP Physics with AP Chem and AP World. (I got all my review books in the mail today-I'm cheap, so I ordered off Amazon.. :P)</p>
<p>I started reading the AP Physics B book and it looks fairly..intimidating. We have good teachers at our school though, and so I'm hopeful.</p>
<p>Anyone else doing AP Physics next year?</p>
<p>I am. I took honors last year so I know a little bit about what’s going on. I was gonna buy a review book but my teacher gives us all a 5 steps to a 5 prep book for free at the beginning of the year. Do you have any summer work? I have to read the first 2 or 3 chapters of my Giancoli textbook and than we have to do 100+ practice problems…he said its gonna take around 10 hours total to do</p>
<p>Wow, you’re a lot more prepared that I am! In my school, people mostly skip ‘regular physics’, which is a regents course and go straight to AP Physics B.
Mostly seniors that didn’t do any advanced science at all take regular physics.</p>
<p>As for summer work, I have none! I’m not sure if that’s a good or bad thing since I’ve heard that physics B is a general overview of a ton of topics-I really hope we don’t have to rush.</p>
<p>100 problems seems like a lot for the summer! At my school, I haven’t heard of any summer work except for english AP’s, none of which I’m taking this year. </p>
<p>I’m learning some of the basic stuff online through hippocampus.org-it’s really good and explains stuff well.
(I was stalking last year’s physics b thread :P)</p>
<p>What? You lucky duck! Summer work only for AP english?? We’ve had to read and annotate at least 2 books ever since middle school. And ap history and ap science courses always give you more to do at ny school. But yea he said we all should have at least started reading the first chapter by the beginning if july because appearently we have a test on the first 3 chapters within the first 2 weeks of school…
But yea im hoping this thread gets a lot of support. It seems to me that physics threads never get as much support as the chem and bio threads do…
Lastly, im definitely not trying to say you’re dumb or anything but from what I hear, ap physics is really hard and without any prior physics knowledge you night have a tough time. I know I most definitely will but im ready for the challenge! Im also taking AP gov, spanish language, and calc bc next year so it should be fun</p>
<p>Wow, your school seems a lot more intense than mine!
My school is actually well ranked for academics, but the teachers tend to not give much homework during the summer and really pile it on during the year :/</p>
<p>I am really nervous for AP without an prior physics but I’ve heard that the teachers are pretty good and everyone does fine, so I’m hoping for the best 
Eitherway, we’ll see how it goes… </p>
<p>Haha, but I’m sure that with that kind of attitude you’ll do awesome.</p>
<p>^ Your schedule sounds tough… I’ve heard that the language AP’s are crazy.
Are you going to be a junior or senior next year? My school doesn’t allow gov/pol till senior year, and most kids don’t take calc BC until junior or senior year.</p>
<p>I’ll be taking AP physics next year. It’s the first time we’ve had it at my school for a few years and we have a new teacher so it should be interesting.</p>
<p>Yea I’ll be a senior next year we can’t take gov or any ap languages til senior year either. And there’s like 5 or 6 juniors every year who manage to get into BC calc</p>
<p>I am! I have no prior knowledge of Physics.</p>
<p>My D is taking AP Physics next year. I saw a mom whose daughter took it last year but only got a 4 on the exam even though she was the top student in the class. D’s school instituted a policy this year that there was to be NO summer work for AP or Honors classes. Probably a victim of budget cuts but who knows.
Anyway, does anyone have a good recommendation for a book to study for the test?</p>
<p>Princeton Review by far is the best for Physics B. Detailed, easy to follow chapters and information. Multiple choice and free response questions following each chapter and 2 full practice tests at the end. Questions are a bit challenging but accurate.</p>
<p>^Second everything but the questions. The MC in PR is more computational than most of what you’ll see on the real exam.</p>
<p>I self-studied this two years ago as my first AP, and self-studied Physics C this past year. My advice for studying physics is posted [url=<a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/10839599-post2.html]here[/url”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/10839599-post2.html]here[/url</a>]. It’s largely aimed towards self-studying but I hope you can still benefit from some of the points I made if you’re taking the class. Good luck, guys!</p>
<p>Yay (:
I’m taking this as a class, but there’ll only be a few kids stepping up to the challenge. I’m also taking APUSH, AP English Lang, AP Calculus, AP Chem, and AP something else but it’s undecided. Hopefully the counselors will be able to accomodate my schedule since there is only one AP Physics B period offered at my school and 2-3 for the rest of them. If she can’t though, I plan on self studying. (and I’ll be majorly ****ed.)</p>
<p>^ouch, that sucks… we normally have scheduling problems figured out well but sometimes that happens to kids at our school too.</p>
<p>I’m trying to study some physics before class starts, so I don’t fail completely.</p>
<p>I have an older edition of
Fundamentals of Physics by Halliday, Resnick and others…can anyone with experience tell me if it’s all right to use for Physics B?</p>
<p>^Halliday and Resnick’s books are calculus-based, so if you’re somewhat familiar with calc or are taking this year, you should be fine if you study the right topics. They’re more suited for Physics C, though, so you might want to find a more introductory book if you want to prepare for B specifically. (I used them for a few months while studying Physics C before I started to get lazy/tired and they were decently challenging.)</p>
<p>yeah, but I’m sure it’ll work it. It always does somehow.
I don’t have any summer homework and this is the first year that the teacher who is teaching my class is teaching AP Physics B. so ehh.
I’m going to buy my review book and read it before school starts once (as long as I don’t procrastinate!)</p>
<p>Energize: If I’m taking calculus next year, should I just self study the Physics C exams? Is there enough overlap between Physics B and AP Calculus that I’d be able to get a 5 with some extra studying with a review book?</p>
<p>If you’re taking calc concurrently, self-studying Physics C shouldn’t be too much of a problem after Physics B. There are some topics not included in B that can be challenging (I’m looking at you, angular momentum!), but with a decent amount of effort, you should be able to handle it. I used Princeton Review and AP Advantage for Physics C and they worked pretty well, except that I didn’t do enough review for E&M, so I got a 5 on mechanics and 4 on E&M.</p>
<p>@ecouter11, um well we use a Giancoli textbook. I’ll have to get back to you on the edition and everything because I can’t really remember right now and I can’t remember where I put it…just a suggestion tho
But how are you guys preparing? Like I said before, I have a ton of summer work to do but what are you guys doing?</p>
<p>Hey you guys! </p>
<p>So I’m still finalizing my schedule, but I’ll be taking AP Physics B along with AP Bio, AP World History and AP Language and Composition.
I’m a rising sophomore too :D</p>
<p>I know some very, very introductory physics but not much beyond that.
Do you guys have any tips for me?</p>
<p>^enjoy your summer and don’t waste it doing schoolwork.
I just started all my summer work today (I go back on Thursday) already having a tough time on projectile motion problems with quadratic formulas…im working with 3 other ppl on this and we can’t get it.</p>
<p>I started school last week. I’m a junior and I’m taking AP Physics, AP Stats, and Pre-Calculus Honors, so I have a lot of math coming my way.</p>