Physics 260 Home Page

Sections 101 - 104

Professor Drew Baden

Spring 2005
10:00 - 10:50am, M/W/F, Physics 1410

Welcome to Physics 260 for engineers.

http://www2.physics.umd.edu/~drew/phy260/spr05
Table of Contents:

 

PHYS 260 is the second semester of a three-semester calculus-based introductory course in physics for scientists and engineers. It satisfies the physics
requirement of the Engineering College.  Topics include: This is, in fact, a large amount of material, and we might very well fall behind in the schedule.

Your Professor for sections 101-104

Text Book

Physics for Scientists and Engineers
Serway and Jewett
6th Edition
Saunders College Publishing
BOTH VOLUMES 1 and 2

Volumes 1 and 2 are available at the book store.  We will be using both, but we won't get to Volume 2 for a month or so. 

A CD found on the back page of your text has not much material relevant to this course. It is not required material, but you may find the simple animations
helpful.

TAs and Recitations Sections

Here is your section times and rooms, and your TA. For a llist of physics TAs, click here:

 

Section 
Day
Time
 Where
TA
 TA/email TA Office TA Phone
TA Office Hours
101
Tue
  800 - 850
 PHY 1219
Ying-Xing Lin
3103B
56189
TBD
103
Wed
1100 - 1150
 PHY 4208
"
"
"
"
"
104
Wed
1200 - 1250
 PHY 4208
"
"
"
"
"

All sections will meet the first week of classes. The TA is there to help you with the concepts, and in particular to solve homework problems. There will be NO QUIZES in the discussion sections.  Just work on homework problems.  If you don't come to discussion because you are not having any difficulties, then that's great.  If you don't come because you think the TA is not doing a very good job, please let me know.  TAs need to learn how to teach, and I will keep your advice in strict confidence, and then will work with the TA to make the discussion section more useful.  If you don't come because you have other reasons, that's your business, you won't be penialized directly.  Note, however, that doing well in this course is really dependent upon doing and understanding the homework.  If you really work at the homework, you will do well.  If you don't, you probably won't.

Homework (using WebAssign)


All homework for a given chapter will be assigned on the day we begin coverage of the chapters in the lectures.  Homework will be due at the beginning of the next chapter, so you will usually hand in homework and get a new assignment on the same day.  See the course calendar below.

Online Web-based homework:  We are going to use the web-based homework system.  The company which supplies this is called WebAssign. It is the not the same system which you used if you took 161 last semester. You will have to pay for this yourself, but it's pretty cheap. The University Book Center will (we believe) be carrying access code cards this semester, available at the cashier (they are not on the shelves), but the Maryland Book Exchange will probably not be carrying these cards. You can also pay for access on the WebAssign site for purchasing. You'll need a credit card of course. The price is $9.95 at the web site and $6.50 if you have a card from the bookstore.

Online homework will consist of problems that you can read, solve, and enter on the computer.  These problems will be graded by the computer, and as such will be of a format that requires an answer that is either correct or not.  The emphasis here is on understanding how to do the problems, not necessarily getting the right answers, but the online programs are quite cleverly written, you will have up to 10 chances to get the correct solution (with instant feedback as to whether your solution is correct), and we have found that students actually can learn from doing these homeworks. We believe this is a better system than the old one where you do the homeworks and give them to a TA to grade.

Login.  Each of you should (hopefully) already have an account. You access your account by going to the homepage, and hit the red. Log In button.  If you do NOT have an account already created, it is probably because I created the account using the UMEG roster list a few weeks ago. Please see me or call me (55947) or email me immediately if you don't find your account there.  Note that you will have 2 weeks of free access to your account before you have to pay, so go ahead and pay right away, don't leave it till the last minute.

To access your account, you will be asked to input:

Assignments.  Once you are logged in, you will see the assignments.  There is also extensive help, I tried it and it's pretty easy.  The important thing to remember is that the computer will grade your answers immediately (well, as long as the WebAssign computers are running and the net isn't clogged) and will tell you whether you got the answer right or not.

Methodology.  You will have multiple tries for each question.  For instance, say you are working on the first question, you calculate it and submit the answer.  When you submit the answer, the computer will tell you if you got it right or not, but the computer will not tell you what the right answer IS.  So, you can "go back to the drawing board", try again, and resubmit.  We think that this really helps you to learn, because in the old days when you just did the problem and hoped it was right, you stopped after the first try.  This way, maybe you will actually understand what to do.  We'll see.  Anyway, I will set the resubmittal level to 10 for the first assignment, but I might make it lower as the semester progresses.  So when you are doing the problem, don't sit there and put random numbers into it, or "guess" and see if that works, just go and figure out how to do the problem and enter the numbers after that.

Randomization.  All students will have the same problems, but the computer will randomize the values of all parameters in each problem, so the answers will be different.  This keeps people from being lazy and copying the answers from others, but it doesn't mean you can't all work together!  That's up to you, and working together cam be a good thing as long as it is done in good faith.

Late homework   For the online homework, you must do it before the closing date.  After the closing date, the grades will not be accepted by the computer, so please, don't screw this up!  The due date will be clearly posted when you log in to do the assignment.

Assignments and Solutions.  Solutions will of course only be posted after the assignments are due.

Exams

  1. Solutions and distributions for exams
    1. Exam 1 solutions (MSWord or PDF) and distribution (PDF)
    2. Exam 2 solutions (MSWord or PDF) and distribution (PDF)
    3. Exam 3 solutions (MSWord or PDF) and distribution (PDF)
    4. Final exam solutions (MSWord or PDF)

     

LAB (261)

Calculators

You may need a calculator during the quizzes and exams, especially one with "scientific" capabilities, i.e., trig, log, exponential, roots, and powers. Memories,
parentheses, radian/degree conversion, etc., are also very helpful. We reserve the right to clear all memories on your calculator (particularly those with
alpha-numerics) at the start of any exam.

Course Grade Summary

2 best mid-term exams 
 30% 
Final exam
25%
Homework
20%
Lab
25%

Course Calendar

As stated above, this calendar is subject to change, depending on how well we get through the material. But we will try very hard to stick to the scheduled exam dates. For a more detailed calendar of University deadlines, click here.

 

  Week
Dates
Covers...
-
Tuesday, Jan 23
 Last day to cancel spring 2005 registration
1
 W/F Jan 26/28  Chapter 14 - Fluids (pressure, pascal's law...)
2
 M Jan 31 , W Feb 2 Chapter 14 - Fluids (buoyancy)
2
 F Feb 4 Chapter 15 - Oscillatory Motion
-
Tuesday, Feb 8
Last day for schedule adjustments and course withdrawal without a "W" (go here for more info)
3
 M/W Feb 7/9 Chapter 15 - SHM/UCM, forced oscillations, damping, resonance...
3
 F Feb 11 Chapter 16 - Wave Motion
4
 M Feb 14 Chapter 16 - Wave Motion
4
 W/F Feb 16/18 Chapter 17 - Sound
5
 M/W Feb 21/23

Chapter 18 - Interference and Superposition
5
Fri  Feb 25
Exam 1, Ch's 14-17 only
  M Feb 28 School closed due to snow
6
 W/F Mar 2/4 Chapter 18 - Interference and Superposition
7
 M/W/F Mar 7/9/11 Chapter 19 - Temperature
8
 M/W/F Mar 14/16/18 Chapter 20 - Heat and 1st Law
-
March 21-27
 SPRING BREAK
9
M/W/F Mar 28/30 Apr 1
Chapter 21 - Kinetic Theory
10
 M/W Apr 4/6 Chapter 23 - Electric Force, Fields, etc.
10
Fri Apr 8
Exam 2, Ch's 18-21 only
11
 M Apr 11 Chapter 23 to Chapter 24 - Gauss' Law
-
Tuesday, April 12
 Last day to drop with a W
11
W/F Apr /13/15
12
 M/W/F Apr 18/20/22 Chapter 25 - Electric Potential
13
 M Apr 25 Chapter 25 - Electric Potential (cont)
13
 W/F Apr 27/29 Chapter 26 - Capacitance
14
 M May 2 Chapter 27 - Current & Resistance
14
Wed May 4
Exam 3, Ch's 23-26
14
 F May 6 Chapter 27 - Current & Resistance (cont)
15
 M/W May 9/11 Chapter 28 - Direct Current
-
Sat May 14
FINAL EXAM, 8:00-10:00 PHY 1410


 

Simulations

For most if not all of these simulation, you should have java installed on your PC. Go to http://www.java.com for info on how to download (it's pretty easy...).