P: Physics I

P.1: Students recognize the nature and scope of physics, including its relationship to other sciences and its ability to describe the natural world. Students learn how physics describes the natural world, using quantities such as velocity, acceleration, force, energy, momentum, and charge. Through experimentation and analysis, students develop skills that enable them to understand the physical environment. They learn to make predictions about natural phenomena by using physical laws to calculate or estimate these quantities. Students learn that this description of nature can be applied to diverse phenomena at scales ranging from the subatomic to the structure of the universe and include everyday events. Students learn how the ideas they study in physics can be used in concert with the ideas of the other sciences. They also learn how physics can help to promote new technologies. Students will be able to communicate what they have learned orally, mathematically, using diagrams, and in writing.

P.1.2: Measure or determine the physical quantities including mass, charge, pressure, volume, temperature, and density of an object or unknown sample.

Density Laboratory

P.1.3: Describe and apply the kinetic molecular theory to the states of matter.

Phase Changes

P.1.6: Describe and measure motion in terms of position, time, and the derived quantities of velocity and acceleration.

Free-Fall Laboratory
Golf Range
Shoot the Monkey

P.1.7: Use Newton's Laws (e.g., F = ma) together with the kinematic equations to predict the motion of an object.

Atwood Machine

P.1.8: Describe the nature of centripetal force and centripetal acceleration (including the formula a = v²/r), and use these ideas to predict the motion of an object.

Free-Fall Laboratory
Golf Range
Shoot the Monkey
Uniform Circular Motion

P.1.9: Use the conservation of energy and conservation of momentum laws to predict, both conceptually and quantitatively, the results of the interactions between objects.

2D Collisions
Air Track

P.1.10: Demonstrate an understanding of the inverse square nature of gravitational and electrostatic forces.

Coulomb Force (Static)
Gravitational Force
Pith Ball Lab

P.1.11: Recognize energy in its different manifestations such as kinetic (KE = ½ mv²), gravitational potential (PE = mgh), thermal, chemical, nuclear, electromagnetic, or mechanical.

Energy Conversion in a System
Energy of a Pendulum
Inclined Plane - Sliding Objects
Potential Energy on Shelves
Roller Coaster Physics

P.1.12: Use the law of conservation of energy to predict the outcome(s) of an energy transformation.

Air Track
Energy Conversion in a System
Energy of a Pendulum
Inclined Plane - Sliding Objects
Roller Coaster Physics

P.1.13: Use the concepts of temperature, thermal energy, transfer of thermal energy, and the mechanical equivalent of heat to predict the results of an energy transfer.

2D Collisions

P.1.15: Distinguish between the concepts of momentum (using the formula p = mv) and energy.

2D Collisions
Air Track
Roller Coaster Physics

P.1.16: Describe circumstances under which each conservation law may be used.

2D Collisions
Air Track
Chemical Equations
Inclined Plane - Sliding Objects

P.1.17: Describe the interaction between stationary charges using Coulomb's Law. Know that the force on a charged particle in an electrical field is qE, where E is the electric field at the position of the particle, and q is the charge of the particle.

Coulomb Force (Static)
Pith Ball Lab

P.1.19: Analyze simple arrangements of electrical components in series and parallel circuits. Know that any resistive element in a DC circuit dissipates energy, which heats the resistor. Calculate the power (rate of energy dissipation), using the formula Power = IV = I2R.

Advanced Circuits
Circuit Builder
Circuits

P.1.20: Describe electric and magnetic forces in terms of the field concept and the relationship between moving charges and magnetic fields. Know that the magnitude of the force on a moving particle with charge q in a magnetic field is qvBsina, where v and B are the magnitudes of vectors v and B and a is the angle between v and B.

Magnetic Induction

P.1.21: Explain the operation of electric generators and motors in terms of Ampere's law and Faraday's law.

Electromagnetic Induction

P.1.22: Describe waves in terms of their fundamental characteristics of velocity, wavelength, frequency or period, and amplitude. Know that radio waves, light, and X-rays are different wavelength bands in the spectrum of electromagnetic waves, whose speed in a vacuum is approximately 3 X 10 to the 8th m/s (186,000 miles/second).

Longitudinal Waves
Refraction
Ripple Tank

P.1.23: Use the principle of superposition to describe the interference effects arising from propagation of several waves through the same medium.

Ripple Tank
Sound Beats and Sine Waves

P.1.24: Use the concepts of reflection, refraction, polarization, transmission, and absorption to predict the motion of waves moving through space and matter.

Refraction

P.1.25: Use the concepts of wave motion to predict conceptually and quantitatively the various properties of a simple optical system.

Refraction

P.1.26: Identify electromagnetic radiation as a wave phenomenon after observing refraction, reflection, and polarization of such radiation.

Refraction

P.1.27: Understand that the temperature of an object is proportional to the average kinetic energy of the molecules in it and that the thermal energy is the sum of all the microscopic potential and kinetic energies.

Temperature and Particle Motion

P.1.29: Describe the nuclear model of the atom in terms of mass and spatial relationships of the electrons, protons, and neutrons.

Element Builder

P.1.30: Explain that the nucleus, although it contains nearly all of the mass of the atom, occupies less than the proportion of the solar system occupied by the sun. Explain that the mass of a neutron or a proton is about 2,000 times greater than the mass of an electron.

Element Builder

P.1.34: Understand and explain the properties of radioactive materials, including half-life, types of emissions, and the relative penetrative powers of each type.

Half-life