<p>well i just finished all my physics summer work after two days. ready to turn it all in tomorrow and get started with senior year. will probably be getting my princeton review book after school because i’ve heard my teacher doesn’t teach two big units on the exam which account for 40% of the thing…smartest kid I know only got a 4 this year</p>
<p>So im gonna try to bring some life back to this thread. What’s everyone doing in their physics class? We’re getting started on projectile motion</p>
<p>HELP! my teacher wanted us to memorize these 3 formulas:
- Vf = Vi + at
- Vf^2 = Vi^2 + 2as
- S = 1/2at^2 + Vi(t)</p>
<p>the only problem is he didn’t tell us what each formula is for and i can’t find them in our book.
so if can you could tell me what each formula is used to find?!? thank you.</p>
<p>We just took our first test, on kinematics (1D and 2D motion, free fall, projectile motion, etc.) It was REALLY hard. We go really fast because we have to cover all of Physics B in one semester. This is the first class in my life I’m really struggling with. Everything else has been pretty easy up until this point.</p>
<p>@ahhdavid
Which book do you use?</p>
<p>The three equations should be described in your book in the motion or kinematics chapter.
They deal with the motion of an object that is uniformly accelerated.
Equation 1 relates the final velocity of an object with its initial velocity, acceleration, and time interval.
Equation 2 is usually used to calculate the displacement of an object that has accelerated uniformly from an initial velocity to a final velocity.
Equation 3 is used to calculate the displacement of an object that has a certain initial velocity and uniformly accelerates for a time interval.</p>
<p>@upsidedown951 your class must be insane. Luckily tho you guys actually cover everything for the exam. My teacher doesn’t cover 40% of the stuff on the exam and barely anyone does well on it. We haven’t even talked about test yet but we started our first lab on Wednesday. I’m so ready for this class to start getting hard</p>
<p>The stuff that we’re doing in class has mostly been introductory things like sig figs, but we’re going to be starting fluid mechanics and thermodynamics.</p>
<p>@knowthestuff Thank you but I am still so lost. My teacher is helpless, he doesn’t teach anything and the book is impossibly hard to read. Does anyone know any websites or books that can help me with this course.</p>
<p>look up the khanacademy videos, they are very helpful and easy to follow.</p>
<p>so it’s been about 2 weeks into the school year and we have done our first lab, finished our discussion of sigfigs today and now we’re finally getting into kinematics in one dimension. this is supposedly the hardest class offered at my school and we’ve done like nothing yet</p>
<p>So I’ve been considering self studying this this year, and what better place to go than this thread? I’m willing to buy the Giancolli book because it seems to be the most reputable. What do you guys think?</p>
<p>Wow @jspeed12 you guys are just now STARTING 1D Kinematics?!? We already had our test on Kinematics, and we have out forces test Friday…</p>
<p>we took our first test on 1D Kinematics…i got a 30% on it :(</p>
<p>i now have an F in the class…i hope i can raise it by December :/</p>
<p>Well today we finally started 2D kinematics. Not sure when we’re having a test. Im probably gonna be self studying most of it because the teacher is so bad
@halemcck, that’s the textbook my class uses and I think its pretty good. However, it sorta makes problems seem waaaaay harder than they actually are</p>
<p>@jspeed same here. My teacher is so bad that we have to teach ourselves using just the textbook and ask her if we have any questions. Her excuse is that it’s like a college class</p>
<p>Buy the Princeton review AP Physics B book, it’s extremely helpful. </p>
<p>And if you have any questions, concept or hw questions, post them here or PM me, I took it last year and can be a valuable source.</p>
<p>Got my first test on thursday on everything up to projectile motion. people last year told me he uses like real AP tests or something where you get like a really low raw score and then there’s some magnificent curve that brings it up like 20 points. but apparently they’re super hard…anyone know what I’m talking about? I’m so nervous</p>
<p>So the test is like this:
30mins MC no equation sheet, no calculator
30mins free response with equation sheet and calculator allowed.
He said the average raw score is around 40-60%. My friend told me the first one was one of the harder ones and it only gets worse from here.
do you guys know if the 5 steps to a 5 prep book is good? He gave all of our class one today</p>
<p>^That’s exactly how our tests are! Except we have an hour and a half, and we get the no calculator MC part first, and we’re on our own the rest of the class. Not timed. So you have to manage your time wisely. I’m learning that the hard way… </p>
<p>Also, before this year, I had heard that PR was best for calc and physics, but now I’m finding that the physics book isn’t in depth at all. It just gives you a page or two on a concept, if that. Like torque, and circular motion which I’m doing now. Anyone else having the same experience?</p>
<p>So yea I got railed by the test. I was doing practice problems from the book last night and I didn’t know how to do only one of them so I was thinking in my head that it most likely wouldn’t show up and the test and low and behold, it was a freakin 15 point free response…I was so mad. I had all day to ask him about it too. No idea why I didn’t…</p>