Space-time coordinates: Lectures are held TTh 9:30-10:45, room MSB-407 on the 4th floor of the Math wing of the Gant Science complex. Lab sections corresponding to these lectures are called Phys 1601Q, sections 001L-003L.

Enrollment: Enrollment, and passage, of the lab requirement is necessary to receive a passing grade for the course. Labs are all held in P-305, and the times as of 1/20/2014 are:

Although not clear from within PeopleSoft, the lecture and lab section numbered 001 are only for students in the honors program. Enrollment in these requires special permission from the honors program, maintenance of a good standing, and completion of certain “extra” requirements. These will be explained in one of the early lab meetings for 001L.

Prerequisites: This course is calculus-based physics for physics majors. Please see the UConn 2013-2014 course catalog or your academic advisor to ensure this course is right for you.

Lecture times and exceptions: Tuesday and Thursday 9:30 - 10:45PM in lecture room MSB-407 located on the fourth floor of the Gant Science complex, Math wing. Spring recess is March 16-22, but there are no other planned campus holidays.

Materials: Registration with the Smart Physics portal, and a means of providing clicker feedback are the only hard materials requirements for the course. To register for Smartphysics, find the course using the course access key is: 1601isfun

Please enter your NETID for the “unique identifier”. It is recommended to use the free 30-day trial for as long as possible, after which you will be asked to pay to use this service. The publisher has said that data is not lost if the trial lapses.

We will use “clickers”, either the i<clicker or the i<clicker2. These should be brought to each class because it is an important part of student participation in class discussion. We will assess the possibility of using cell -phone-based “iclicker GO” in the first week of class if there is a strong interest, and test show that it is glitch-free in our venue.

An optional soft copy textbook for the course is:

Gary Gladding, Mats Selen, Tim Stelzer, “Smart Physics: Classical Mechanics”

which is essentially a shadow of the online SmartPhysics materials. It can be a useful reference, but some students prefer to use the online materials exclusively.

The following optional text may be helpful as well:

Paul A. Tipler and Gene P. Mosca, “Physics for Scientists and Engineers, volume 1, Chapters 1-20”

Course learning activities (and locations): In-class meetings, web-based activities are used extensively in the course through the Smart Physics portal. The activities associated with this course fall into five categories:

    Prelectures (Smart Physics portal): New materials are introduced in these web-based presentations with conceptual questions interlaced.

    Checkpoints (Smart Physics portal): These brief question sets go deeper than the prelecture questions and probe your understanding, or mis-understanding, of the material.

    In-class discussion (MSB-407): Material will be discussed in more depth in class to set up for conceptual questions and “clicker” polling. Example problems will be worked out to demonstrate tactics and approaches to problem solving.

    Homework (Smart Physics portal): These will be due normally the week after the associated material is presented. Homework is more quantitative and challenging than the other web-based materials. Students do best when they start early, as there are many campus resources for help with physics homework (see Additional help below).

    Lab (P-305): The lab is a separate registration from the lecture and you cannot get credit for either without registration in the lab section. Please see the course catalog, departmental guidelines, or your academic advisor for more information.

    Exams (MSB-407): Mid-term exams will be take home and the first will be handed out March 11 after class and collected March 13 before class. You must work independently and any coordination is considered academic misconduct. Exams cover ranges of materials, consisting of both conceptual and quantitative questions. A complete understanding of previously-assigned homework solutions will be very helpful for studying. A cumulative final exam will be given some time the week of May 5, with the exact time and date to be determined by the registrar.

Evaluation: The final grade will be evaluated in a balanced combination of the following factors

Homework  (must attempt at least 1/2)    18%

Clicker participation                                 6%

Prelectures/Checkpoints participation   6%

Lab                                                             25%

Mid-term 1/Mid-term 2/Final         15/15/15%

Additional help: The UConn library’s Q center (Level 1 Babbage) is a great resource for getting help with homework and has fairly extensive hours. The Physics department’s Physics Learning Resource Center (PLRC) (Math Building MSB-207) is another place you can go when you have questions about your homework assignment or concepts. Both of these efforts are staffed by science graduate students and are free of charge.

Academic misconduct: There is a zero-tolerance policy for any form of academic misconduct. An explanation of the student code for academic misconduct can be found here. Don’t do it!

Course Completion: Students may not miss more than one lab and still receive credit for the course. Students who miss two or more labs, or whose combined lab grade is less than 50%, will be given a final grade of incomplete for the course. The final exam and a minimum 50% effort of each component of the course are required.

Office hours:

    Jason Hancock   P-315:    Wednesday 10-11:30, Thursday 3-4:30

Contact: jason.hancock@uconn.edu

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Below is a quick sketch of the schedule in terms of material. As lectures are given, slides and relevant material will be posted here, at which time you can click on the date to download a .pdf of the lecture slides for that day. A more detailed schedule of prelecture, checkpoint, and homework exercises can be found in the Smart Physics portal. The course access key is 1601isfun

Week                         Lecture Content/reading                                          Lab

Jan 21                       Measurement, vectors, and 1D motion                 No lab

Jan 28, 30                 2-D & 3-D, relative, circular motion                     Graphs

Feb 4, 6                    Newton’s Laws and Forces                                    Free fall

Feb 11, 13                  Friction and Work and Energy                             Forces (force table)

Feb 18, 20                Conservative forces and potential energy             Atwood’s machine

Feb 25, 27                 Center of mass and momentum                            Simple pendulum

Mar 4, 6                   Collisions                                                                 Buoyancy

Mar 11, 13                 Moment of inertia, parallel axes, torque               Momentum/Air table

Mar 11-13                 FIRST MIDTERM (TAKE HOME) First Midterm Solutions

            Fall 2013 exam #1, Solutions, Fall 2012 exam #1, Solutions

            Fall 2013 exam #2, Solutions, Fall 2012 exam #2, Solutions

Mar 16-22                Spring Break - no lectures or labs                         

May 25, 27               Angular momentum                                                 Collisions/air track

April 1, 3                  Simple oscillators and pendula                               Addition of torques

April 8, 10               Waves                                                                       Dynamics effects/Torques

April 15, 17               Superposition and static fluids                               Gyroscope

April 15-17                SECOND MIDTERM (TAKE HOME) Second Midterm Solutions

April 22, 24              Temperature, kinetic theory, heat                         Ruchard’s method

April 29, May 1       Ideal gas, equipartition, heat capacity                    Make-up

May 7-9                     FINAL EXAM (Take Home)

FINAL EXAM Must be turned into the main physics office by 4pm on Friday, May 7!

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