http://www.chabotcollege.edu/faculty/shildreth/physics/4asyllfall09.html

Physics 4A - Chabot College - Scott Hildreth

Autumn 2009 Syllabus

Homework - Calendar - Mastering Physics - ActivPhysics Aplets

Blackboard site default userid: physics4a / password physicsstudent.

Mastering Physics class ID: PHYSICS4AFALL2009HILDRETH userid: physics4astudents / password fall2009

Office Hours: Always one hour before and after our classes Mondays and Wednesdays, in my office; I also might be in the physics lab (1714). Fridays before class from 12:00-1:00. My complete office hours for the term are available online at my home page: http://www.chabotcollege.edu/faculty/shildreth/. You can also make an appointment to see me at another time that fits your schedule. If you ever come by and miss me, please leave a note with your name, phone number, and the best time to reach you, and I will call you back.

I will check email multiple times every day, and I recommend this as the best way to reach me! However, you MUST include a clear SUBJECT message in your email, and your name, to ensure that your email will not be treated as "SPAM" and automatically deleted. I check my voicemail messages, but not daily. If you have an urgent need, and cannot get to email, leave me a voicemail message but do not expect an answer back the same day.

About Physics 4A, General Physics: Mechanics (the study of motion)

This is the first course of a 3 or 4-semester sequence of physics courses with calculus, designed for students majoring in:

• Some biological sciences
• Engineering
• Physics, Geology, Astronomy, or Chemistry

Students who take Physics 4 generally are planning to transfer to four-year schools. Many Chabot students have gone on with great success to California State University campuses at Hayward, San Jose, and San Francisco, as well as Cal Poly SLO, and University of California campuses at Berkeley and Davis, among other schools. Chabot College has "articulation agreements" with these schools, which guarantee that your successful completion of Physics 4A at Chabot will be deemed equivalent to the same course at those schools. Your units will transfer, and you can continue in their physics sequence or continue on to more advanced work.

Subject Prerequisites for the course include:

• Mathematics: You must have passed Math 1 with a grade of "C" or higher.  If you are currently enrolled in Math 1, you *must* see me immediately to ensure you are able to attend. Calculus is required and will be used heavily, especially integration. Students currently in Math 1 will find that some techniques used in Physics 4A will not be discussed in their Math classes until later in the term.
   
• Physics: You are not expected to have taken physics in high school, but certainly exposure to concepts in a previous physics class will help. 
   
• English: You will be writing essays, papers and laboratory reviews in this class, as well as using email to share your homework answers and discussion questions. You will be expected to read and listen to posted lectures, and read the textbook. While there is no course prerequisite for English, basic college-level reading and writing skills are assumed.

Required Materials

1. Primary Textbook

Physics for Scientists and Engineers with Modern Physics and MasteringPhysics, 4/E
Douglas C. Giancoli

You have several options for this book, but you will have to purchase Mastering Physics no matter what version or option you select.
 

            This is the combined book needed for all three calculus based physics classes at Chabot (and UC Berkeley!).  Get this if possible if you know you'll be taking Physics 4A/4B/4C.

This is volume 1 only - all we will use in Physics 4A.  If you are planning to transfer after this term, or *know* you only need one semester of university-level calculus physics, this book might be sufficient.  But before you decide this, please check on your transfer institution.  You'll spend more money buying the volume individually if you need more than one.

You can also purchase the book as a completely online edition, bundled with Mastering Physics, for approx. $121.  See below for details.  If you have the third edition version of Giancoli's book, you may choose to use it, but you will be responsible for making sure you do the correct homework problems out of the 4th edition text, and you must also purchase Mastering Physics access for our textbook.   Also note that this is the first term we'll be using this book at Chabot, so the bookstore will be buying back used copies at the end of the school term.

2. Discussion Textbook

Ranking Task Exercises in Physics: Student Edition
By T L O'Kuma, D P Maloney, C J Hieggelke

ISBN-10: 0-13-144851-X        ISBN-13: 978-0-13-144851-3

Approx. $36, available online and in the Chabot College bookstore.
 

3. Required Homework & Tutorial Online System

This term, all of the Physics 4 classes will be using an advanced, online homework and tutorial system called Mastering Physics. If you purchase a new textbook, it will come with an individual access code.  If you purchase a used book, or use another author's book, you will still be required to participate in the homework assignments using Mastering Physics, and you can purchase your own access code online for $45.00 at the Mastering Physics website  or $121 with the e-book.  The code works for 1 year, and will allow you to continue in Physics 4B without purchasing another code.

Other Requirements for our course:

Calculator: Multi-function with trig, statistics, exponentials. Graphing capability is optional.
Internet:  You need not own a computer, but you must have access to a computer (on campus, at work, or at home) that can access the Internet to participate in this class. In addition to the publisher site, we have a Blackboard shell for discussion, quizzes, tutorials, and homework/lab review.

Attendance

Physics 4A includes 1.25 hours of lecture/discussion each week on Mondays and Wednesday, 1 hour of discussion on Friday morning, and 3 hours of laboratory/discussion/quizzes each week on Fridays.  You must attend the lecture/discussion sections and the laboratory each week; attendance will be taken and factored into your overall course grade as "participation" credit. If you do miss class, I expect you to login to our online course site on Blackboard to respond to questions, post comments, and let me know you are still in our class. If you must miss a discussion or lab, you must notify me and attempt to make arrangements to do make-up work. Missing 4 consecutive hours or 6 hours overall without advance notice will be cause for withdrawal.
 

Grading:

• Exams: 40% -- weighted as follows:

Homework & Homework Quizzes: 24%

Labs & Research Paper: 20% -- about 12% on the labs in class, and 8% on the research paper and class presentation.

Discussion, Group Work, & Class Participation: 16%

Exams (40% of grade)

There will be 2 two-hour exams (held in the laboratory sections) and 1 two-hour final exam in the class. The exams include both essays and numerical problems. Check the course calendar for the tentative exam dates. Sample questions for the exams will be provided to help you prepare.

• Exams will be closed-book, and a green-book is required. A calculator is allowed, and an English dictionary if needed.
   
• A formula sheet will be provided. No other formulae or support tools will be allowed, and any attempt to bring into the exam any extra materials is unacceptable, as is helping or receiving help from others. If detected, you will immediately receive a failing grade for the exam. Please don't test this policy.
   
• Unless you contact me well in advance, I expect you to attend and complete the exams. If you miss an exam without advance notice, your grade for the test will necessarily be "0". There are no exceptions.
  
  
• Partial Credit will be given for clearly written explanations of concepts, labeled diagrams, and partial completion of formulae. No credit will be given for answers that are not explained.
  
  
• To pass the class, you must score at least 40% on the exams overall.  In other words, if you don't score 40% on the exams overall, no matter how well you do on the homework or labs, you still may not pass the class.  If you don't achieve a 40% success level on the first two exams, you must achieve that level on the final exam to earn a barely passing grade of "D" in the class regardless of how you do on the homework and labs. 

Homework & Homework Quizzes (24% of grade)

One of the most important factors for your success in Physics 4C, and future success at a 4-year school, will be your ability to solve basic physics problems and demonstrate your understanding of key concepts. And the best training to help you learn how to solve problems and really wrestle with those concepts is through lots of homework!

• Homework will be assigned each week (usually on a Wednesday), and due the following week (also usually on Wednesday, or occasionally Friday).
  
• Homework will be assigned using Mastering Physics, an online problem and tutorial system.  Every student is required to purchase an individual access code (bundled with the new books, and available separately from the publisher.)  Codes cannot be shared.
   
• With our Mastering Physics online system, you will not be required to turn in all numerical problems on paper.  I will ask you to turn in one or two problems on paper, and I also will ask you to answer some additional discussion questions on paper to be turned in or emailed to me by the due date. 
  
  I still recommend that you work out problems first on paper (as that is the way exams will work!), and that you  keep all of your assignments in a narrow, 3-ring binder. During the term I may ask you to produce all of your assignments to review your grades and progress, and keeping a portfolio of your work is always a great idea in preparation for transfer, or seeking employment.
  
• You are encouraged to work together on homework assignments, but everyone will need to enter their solutions online individually.
  
• Late homework will automatically be penalized by the online system, losing credit for each day it is late. Unless you have contacted me in advance and received my concurrence about submitting late work, these late-work penalties will apply. 
  
• Solutions to numeric problems will be available online immediately within Mastering Physics.  In addition, I'll create paper versions of my own solutions, and share these with you in class.
  
• Expect to spend at least 4-5 hours a week outside of class on homework problems. In addition, you will need to plan on at least 4-5 hours a week outside of class for lab work, papers, and studying for exams, and another 1-2 hours a week in online discussion, office hours, or on-campus study groups.  This is a 5-unit class, requiring 7 hours a week of time on-campus and at least 10 hours outside of class each week.
  
• Expect an occasional short quiz in the following week's lab section on homework problems. Whether you work in groups or alone on your homework assignments, the quizzes will be solo efforts. Everyone working in a study group must be able to do all of the assigned problems.
  
• There will be no makeup homework quizzes, whether your absences from labs are excused or not.
   

Lab Sections & Lab Write-ups (20% of grade)

Labs will give you a hands-on chance to investigate concepts. You will work in groups to set-up, perform, and analyze experiments, and submit a group (or individual) write-up according to our Chabot College Physics Department Laboratory Report Standards. Attendance is required, and typically there will not be opportunities to make-up missed lab exercises. A research paper on one aspect of physics in today's society will be assigned, counting for about 5 labs. Students will present their paper in the lab.

Class Participation & Discussion (16% of grade)

Current research in physics learning shows that active group discussion is the most important ingredient for student success. Each week we will work in groups to explore concepts and problem-solving techniques. Attendance is required, and your active participation will be factored into your overall course grade. We'll often use Mastering Physics for our group work, and everyone in the group will share one ID and the credit for the work done together in class as long as each member of the team is mentioned in an email submitted to me for each problem.  If you miss a class, you can work on these problems yourself but remember that doing so individually will NOT translate to the same participation/achievement grade as doing them in class, with others.  In all your interactions in our class, whether on-campus or on-line, you are expected to participate respectfully and collegially. Please refer to the Chabot College Catalog for general expectations of student conduct in our course.

Grades will be based on an approximate scale, with extra factors taken into consideration if you are close to grade "borders" (like improvement during the term, group participation, attendance, etc.), and with the condition that you must pass exams with at least 40% score to pass the class regardless of other work.

• To earn an "A" in the class, you will need a composite score of 80% or higher.
• To earn a "B" in the class, you will need a composite score of 65% or higher.
• To earn a "C" in the class, you will need a composite score of 50% or higher.
• To earn a "D" in the class, you will need a composite score of 40% or higher.

Turning in Material & Late Work Policies

You may submit work in class, during office hours, under my door, and by Blackboard messages. Late work will not be accepted without advanced approval from me. Late lab reports will receive 50% credit at best. There is no opportunity to makeup homework quizzes or missed labs.

If you submit your work via email and attachments, it is your responsibility to ensure that any attachment is readable and properly formatted and virus-free. If I cannot read an attachment, I will reply to your email and request you resend your message with the text and answer in the body of the email message. I suggest standardizing on "Microsoft Word" as a default format. Make a print copy of your work as a backup.

Academic Integrity:

I expect all work turned in to be original, and any research material for papers, labs, or extra credit, whether copied or paraphrased, must be cited to received proper credit. Be sure to use quotation marks, and note references. Copying material from the text or other sources without giving a reference is not acceptable. I want to know what you think, not what someone else thought! If you use the Internet to assist with assignments and extra credit, you must include the URL, the universal resource locator, that identifies the sources. Citation styles for all work should follow the MLA style; a handout about this style for web resources is available online.

At a minimum, you must include the name of the site or title page of the webpage you access, the author if known, the date the site was created, the institution or organization hosting the site, the date you accessed the site, and the URL:

Victorian Women Writers Project. Ed. Perry Willett. Apr. 1997. Indiana U. Accessed: 26 Apr. 1997 <http:// www.indiana.edu/~letrs/vwwp/>.

Hints & Suggestions for Success!

1. Create a study group. Working with others is a great way to check your understanding of the assignments and the concepts. In the first assignment, you will introduce yourself to the class, and learn about your classmates. Read what they say, and call or email 2 or 3 to say you are interested in forming a study group. You are free to set up and join multiple groups, but try at least one, and if that doesn't work, look for another.
   
   
2. Model, Simulate, Reproduce, Experiment! Don't miss an opportunity to build mental AND physical models for problems and questions. Make sketches of what is happening (and label the pieces clearly.) Use blocks, wheels, pencils, erasers, paperclips, books -- whatever you have handy to create a physical analogy for problems. If a question asks about a battery and a light bulb, try to build it! (Your family and/or co-workers may think you a bit strange, but only until you show them your passing grades in the class! Then they'll be very impressed.) Building mental and physical models is one technique that every great physicist seems to have shared, from Archimedes to Galileo, from Newton to Einstein to Feynman.
   
   
3. Involve friends & family. Sometimes the very best way to learn something is to TEACH others; in this class, you'll have lots of interesting questions about how the world works, and you should actively try those questions -- and your answers! -- on willing friends and family members. Tell them you really need their help! See if they understand a bit better after you have explained what happened. When you submit your homework solutions, actively comment on those posted by your classmates. Help them understand how you see the problem. Teach them what you know. Not only will they benefit, but you will too! You'll find you understand the problem much better, and occasionally by trying to explain what you think you know, you'll find you have to start completely over. But that's OK! You are learning, and that is the goal for this class.
   
   
4. Set up a REGULAR time to do the work. College classes allow you more flexibility with your schedule, but they are also seductive in their ability to allow you to procrastinate. If you wait until 11 pm Tuesday to start the homework due Wednesday, I guarantee that you will have a very hard time! Be rigorous with yourself, and set up a schedule each week when you will read the book, start the homework, etc. The self-discipline you encourage is a skill even more useful than what you learn about physics! (Yes, I really mean that! So do employers looking for self-motivated, independent and hard-working folks.)
   
   
5. Let me help! Call me, email me, stop by and leave a note if you can. Use the discussion sections, the discussion forum, whatever works for you. No one learns physics very well by picking up a textbook and just reading alone -- even the best scientists in the world have to check their understanding by bouncing their ideas off others, and asking for advice and help.

Online Resources:

1. Class websites

http://www.chabotcollege.edu/faculty/shildreth/physics/4asyllfall09.html

This is the class website, with the syllabus, calendar, links to other physics courses on the web, and lecture outlines. You can send me email, and get information on the research project paper. This site also has a link to the following online discussion forum:

2. Class Discussion Board

http://clpccd.blackboard.com

This is our online classroom where you can post messages, review homework and practice exam answers, take quizzes, and see great simulation tools to help you learn Physics. Your Username and Password are pre-set if you have registered for the course.

• Go to the online course site, and save the page as one of your favorite sites (if you use Explorer or AOL), or "bookmark" the page, if you use Netscape). Login instructions are available at: http://www.chabotcollege.edu/DistanceEd/
  
  
• If you are officially enrolled, you can login with a Username which is your User Identification Number, the (unique) number beginning with a W and containing 8 digits given to you by the College when you registered. You can also find out your W-number using CLASS-Web.
  
  Your initial password is the first two letters of your first name, followed by the first two letters of your last name (all lowercased), followed by the last four digits of your User Identification Number. For example, Maria Valdez with a UIN of W98765432 would log in as: Username: W98765432 Password: mava5432
   
• If you are waiting to ADD, you can login to the Blackboard site using a default userid of physics4a and password physicsstudent.
   
• If you have problems with the Blackboard login to our course, please:
  
  - visit the Chabot College Blackboard Support webpages. There is a ton of information about logging into Blackboard for the first time, and there are some on-campus orientations available to help you as well.
  
  - Request help from the Chabot College Blackboard Help Form. Include your name, that you are enrolled in my Physics 4 Course at Chabot College (Section 001 - CRN ). Email me as well so that I can ensure your name and password were entered correctly.

3. Publisher Websites

http://www.masteringphysics.com

This is the online portal to the Mastering Physics system for our textbook by Giancoli, 4th ed.  From here, create your own userid and password.  You'll need your personal access code only once, and from then on, can access the site with your userid and password.  I would suggest using the same userid and password as that for Blackboard.

You will need our Mastering Physics class ID: PHYSICS4AFALL2009HILDRETH

I have set up a default userid of physics4astudents and password fall2009 for you to use if you are waiting to ADD or purchase your textbook.

http://media.pearsoncmg.com/aw/aw_activphysics/aw_giancoli_physicspse_4/part1.htm

The publisher has an excellent companion website for our book that students found quite useful, using "ActivPhysics", a comprehensive set of java tutorials and collaborative questions.  We'll sometimes use these in our class work. 

Back to Chabot College Home Page

Questions? Email me at shildreth@chabotcollege.edu

8/16/09 - SH