<p>Post how you are studying in your class/ if you are self studying.</p>
<p>Less than 2 weeks away!</p>
<p>I’m taking both Mechanics and E/M…:[[
I just need to practice using the Calculus…and practice free response questions…
Also I need to study Induction and magnetism, since we haven’t really covered that part yet. I’m currently taking a class, not self-studying, but the teacher doesn’t really prep towards the AP test, he likes to teach his own method.</p>
<p>We’re just doing tons and tons of practice tests in class, especially multiple choice. It seems like the class is fine with Mechanics but struggles hard with E&M…especially those parts where you need to integrate from infinity to the surfaces of spherical condurctors and from the surface to the inside to determine the work done…yea it gets even more confusing with all the non-uniform charge density stuff.</p>
<p>We’re also discussing special cases where you can easily mistake rods as cylinders and you’d use Point-Charge physics to solve for the Electric Field instead of Gauss’s Law.</p>
<p>We’re pretty much done reviewing actually, we’re learning Quantum Mechanics now lol.</p>
<p>Almost a week left. I am working on mult choice/ reviewing previous years FRQ’s. Still need to review LR circuits.</p>
<p>
Yea…all that is confusing…not hard, but confusing. I haven’t really gone over it yet, so I don’t really know how to solve any of it…</p>
<p>^ But the test is in less than a week.</p>
<p>I have been self studying, and it’s been terrifying since no one can help me.
I’ve tried asking my Physics teacher, but even he does not remember some of the fundamental concepts off the top of his head…</p>
<p>I am really worried now…</p>
<p>Derivate, are you using a prep book? Princeton Review is AWESOME for self-studiers (especially Physics C). Its even helping me out in my areas of weakness. Well yea, there IS exactly a week left so get working lol. Even if there’s no-one at your school who can help, there’s always the internet. There’s tons and tons of stuff-to-know and study guides online.</p>
<p>In our class, out of 23 students: 18 got 5’s and the rest got 4’s on a full-length practice test. So we’re fairly set for this…hopefully.</p>
<p>Yea, the cutoff is extremely lenient for Physics C. It’s like 55% for a 5 on both mechanics and e/m.</p>
<p>The cutoff isn’t that different for Physics B (usually, about 60%)…</p>
<p>+53 is a 5, +37 is a 4 (this is out of 80; on both the Physics C exams).
Its lenient because it is considered to be the hardest AP exam of all.</p>
<p>I’m really worried for E and M. Circuits and stuff I’m down with, electric fields I kind of understand, but EVERYTHING that deals with magnetism makes absolutely no sense. I can get induced current due to flux changes, but that’s only because I have seen that problem so many times. What do you guys think is the best way to review for magnetism? I don’t want to use my AP Textbook, because it really doesn’t explain stuff that well.</p>
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[QUOTE=Senior0991]
I’m really worried for E and M. Circuits and stuff I’m down with, electric fields I kind of understand, but EVERYTHING that deals with magnetism makes absolutely no sense. I can get induced current due to flux changes, but that’s only because I have seen that problem so many times. What do you guys think is the best way to review for magnetism? I don’t want to use my AP Textbook, because it really doesn’t explain stuff that well.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Induced emf / current is the easier part of magnetism. Yea, we’ve done those kinds of problems tons of times too. Here’s some examples of the kinds of problems you should expect on the magnetism part:</p>
<ul>
<li>Ampere’s Law to find B-Field (situations where you can have constant shapes as your Amperean loops)</li>
<li>Biot-Savart Law to find B-Field (situations where you can NOT have constant shapes as your Amperean loops, i.e., a ring of current-carrying wire and you want the B-Field at some point P around it)</li>
<li>Magnetic Field caused on a loop of wire caused by another infinitely long wire carrying a current (easy to get confused on these).</li>
<li>Loop of current-carrying wire moving at a constant velocity in a B-Field.</li>
<li>Any sort of mechanics problem taking place in the presence of a magnetic field (these are so annoying).</li>
<li>How the presence of inductors in circuits affects the current through the circuit (yes, believe it or not, this has to do with magnetism).</li>
<li>Most important equations:
F = qv x B
F = Il x B</li>
</ul>
<p>If you know and get how to do these (and some flux change problems), you should be well off for around a mid-4. Best way to review is definitely try tons and tons of practice problems from collegeboard - even if you get them wrong, you’re learning something by seeing the right solution and knowing how to approach such a problem.
Best review “book” would be Princeton Review, hands down. It explains every single step and WHY you need to do it. It goes over pretty much all kinds of problems.</p>
<p>Lol everything above sounds like Physics B.</p>
<p>except our teacher introduced some weird stuff about single circular loops and solenoid equations which we don’t have to know.</p>
<p>
[QUOTE=jzhang722]
Lol everything above sounds like Physics B.</p>
<p>except our teacher introduced some weird stuff about single circular loops and solenoid equations which we don’t have to know.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Yea but B has simplistic and more algebra-based calculations once you’ve got the physics down. C requires calculus because of the nature of the problems. You need integrals for basically anything and everything.</p>
<p>Physics C is basically that everything Physics B is (except Waves & Optics), based on calculus instead of algebra. Its a lot more math heavy with all the vector cross products / dot products in play.</p>
<p>I’m taking Physics B this year, and I’m probably going to get a 4 (maybe a 5), and next year I’ll be taking Calculus AB (I’m a pretty strong math student). Would you recommend self studying Physics C next year? (Our school doesn’t have the course)</p>
<p>i am taking ap physics c test. do we get formula sheet for mc?</p>
<p>no formula sheet, no calculator for MC.</p>
<p>our teacher hasn’t taught us crap all year (basically he divided us into groups to learn a different E&M section every time, and our whole class is a bunch of lazy seniors so we did nothing but sit around and stare confusingly at the textbook while our teacher would look up youtube on his laptop). in a practice test, only 1 person in our class of 23 got a 5 and 1 person got a 4. everyone else got 1s and 2s…■■■</p>
<p>thanks for the help.</p>
<p>Ya I bought a PR book along with a Giancoli textbook. Its just dense. I think I can pull a 5 for mech, but the E+M FRQ’s are just brutal sometimes. </p>
<p>I am alright with Gauss’ Law, but circuits and magnetic fields are a bit harder.</p>
<p>If I can pull this off in a week… I will be very impressed.</p>
<p>
[QUOTE=jzhang72]
I’m taking Physics B this year, and I’m probably going to get a 4 (maybe a 5), and next year I’ll be taking Calculus AB (I’m a pretty strong math student). Would you recommend self studying Physics C next year? (Our school doesn’t have the course)
[/quote]
</p>
<p>If you do plan to self-study, you really need the motivation to do so…trust me. People IN the course who are concurrently enrolled in Calc are finding Physics C challenging…so you can imagine what self-studying it would be like.
One thing I’ve noticed, however, is that everyone in my class who has finished Calc BC last year are finding Physics C relatively easy (both Mech and E&M), especially the Calculus parts…its easy to get and understand because they’ve done similar conceptual problems before.</p>
<p>I’m concurrently enrolled in Calc AB and I’m finding it slightly challenging aswell (especially Mechanics, E&M atleast I know what I’m supposed to do).
So…if you’ve GOT THE WILL to put the time in and study throughout the year (not just two months before the AP, that’ll get you nowhere), go for it.
Princeton Review is my recommendation, clearly explained steps for problems and why you need to do all of those steps…it even goes in detail and assumes you’re currently “learning” calculus, not already learned it.</p>
<p>5 days left… Finished BC today; was not that bad. How does Physics E+M difficulty compare to BC?</p>