If you wish to talk with an academic
counselor
about becoming
a physics major or minor, or have general questions about the physics
program, please contact Margot Nims
[margot@phys.washington.edu,
C139 PAB, 543-2772].
Office Hours: Monday 1:30-2:30, in my office.
Tuesday 11:40-12:30 in the study center.
Additional hours prior to exams will be announced
in class and on this page.
Richard P. Feynman, Robert B. Leighton and
Matthew Sands,
"The Feynman Lectures on Physics", Addison-Wesley,
(ISBN: 0201021153). This is a three volume set.
These lectures are fantastic supplementary reading, though hard
to learn from the first time.
Teaching assistants wil be available for consultation
in the Physics Study Center located in Room AM018.
It is staffed from approximately 9:30am-4:30pm on weekdays.
Weekly short
pretests
will be administered on the
web. These are intended to start you thinking
about concepts that will be addressed in the tutorial
later in the week. Pretest questions will be posted
in the tutorial room. Completion of pretests will
be a factor in determining your course grade.
Weekly "lecture HW" assignments will consist of 10-15 problems
divided between two components:
Problems using the computer-based
Tycho
system. The Tycho web page provides instructions as to how to log in.
PLEASE NOTE:
you only need to do the problems listed as 123 Honors---although
you have access to the regular 122 problems if you want
more practice.
Homework must be submitted over the web.
Deadlines will be announced with each assignment; the
typical due date will be 9:20am Wednesday
the week after it the assignment is announced,
with a second deadline (for 70% credit) at 9:20am Friday.
(Note that these times will usually
differ from those in the regular sequence classes.)
See
here for more information on using Tycho.
Problems from the text (HRK) plus occasional problems that I write.
These will be assigned in class each week and will be due in class
the following week, usually on Wednesdays. Solutions will be posted
on the web
here..
The assignments will be listed
here.
Worked example problems will also be posted each week
here.
A few (typically two)
problems from each assignment will be graded in detail.
Problems with grading should
be addressed to the TA: attach an explanation of the concern, written
on a separate sheet of paper, to your homework, which itself should
not be changed.
Tutorial
homework
will be assigned and collected
in tutorial sections. One problem from each assignment
will be graded in detail.
There will be three 50 minute midterms
(Fridays April 16th, May 7th and May 28th)
and a two-hour final exam
(Wednesday June 9, 8:30-10:20am). All will take place in
the lecture room, A118.
Each exam will consist of various types of problems:
some similar to the homework assigned in lectures,
others based on material discussed in the tutorials,
and others related to laboratory experiments.
There will be a roughly equal mix of multiple choice and standard
questions.
The one-hour exams will emphasize the material covered
in the prior two or three weeks,
but may include earlier topics too.
The final exam will be comprehensive.
The standard cover sheet for exams is
here
.
All exams will be CLOSED BOOK
with one sheet of notes allowed---four such sheets for the final.
Calculators are allowed and recommended.
You must bring a bubble sheet.
If you think there is an error in the grading of
an exam, or in the adding up of points, you
may return your exam for regrading.
To do so, you must resubmit the exam at the
beginning of the lecture following the one in which
the exams were returned. Attach a brief note to the
exam (preferably using the
regrade
form )
explaining the possible mistake(s). Do NOT
make any marks or changes on the original exam.
Please note that portions of each exam are
photocopied, and that a regrade request may trigger
a regrading of other parts of the exam as well,
so that it is possible that your total score may
decrease.
Examples
of previous exam questions will be posted before each exam
on the
handouts link .
Solutions will be posted after the exams, along with
exam statistics.
Your course grade will be computed
using weightings close to the following.
30-35%---your two best midterms
25-30%---final exam
15%---laboratory
7.5%---lecture homework
7.5%---Tycho homework
10%---tutorial homework
Note that your lowest midterm score will be
dropped, and that there will be NO make-up exams.
Normally a grade of 0.0 will be given to students
who do not take the final or who miss two midterms.
A grade of 0.0 will also be given to anyone not completing 6
labs (out of the total 8), irrespective of their
performance in the rest of the course.