Final exam layout

The final exam will be broken up into 5 sections. In each section, you will have a few required multiple choice questions and a choice of problems (4 problems given, solve any 2). The multiple choice questions will require some calculations, but will be much shorter than the problems. Here are the details of each section, with the corresponding sections of the book noted.

Overall, you need to do 10 problems and 12 multiple choice questions. An extensive formula sheet will be given, and you will be allowed to bring in two sheets of paper (front and back) with your own notes.

Section 1: Kinematics

• 2.2-10 (1D motion)
• 4.2-7 (2D motion)
• 5.2-9, 6.2-5 (forces)

2 required multiple choice questions, choose 2 of 4 problems

Section 2: momentum and energy

• 7.2-8 (K, work)
• 8.2-8 (PE, consv. E)
• 9.2-10 (p)

4 required multiple choice questions, choose 2 of 4 problems

Section 3: rotation and gravitation

• 10.2-10 (rotation)
• 11.2-4, 6-11 (torque, angular momentum)
• 13.2-8 (gravitation)

1 required multiple choice question, choose 2 of 4 problems

Section 4: oscillations and waves

• 15.2-7 (oscillations)
• 16.2-10, 17.2-5 (waves)

2 required multiple choice questions, choose 2 of 3 problems

Section 5: fluids & thermodynamics

• 14.2-10 (fluids)
• 18.6-11 (temperature, heat)
• 19.3-5, 11 (kinetic theory of gasses)

3 required multiple choice questions, choose 2 of 4 problems

Exam 4 and its solution

Here is exam 4 and its solution. Though it was an optional exam, it is a reasonable guide to what sort of questions I might ask about oscillations and gravitation on the final.

Details of the final exam coming soon.

HW6 solutions

Here you go. Final exam details and Exam 4 solutions coming shortly.

Grades updated

I've posted the grades to Blackboard again, and the lab grades should show up now. I also made a few corrections based on your feedback.

Please check carefully that all the HW sets you turned in have grades. If your lab or quiz average doesn't seem to make sense, let me know and I'll give you a detailed breakdown.

If you took the optional fourth exam on Wednesday, I'll have your graded exams back on Friday. Though very few of you took it, you chose wisely: each of you did improve your grade. (That's not to say anyone made a mistake by not taking it - for the fourth exam to really be a good call, you had to be on the borderline between grades and have one anomalously low exam grade. Not many of you fit that scenario.)

Grades online

I've just posted your grades on Blackboard. TL;DR check them carefully. UPDATE - the lab grades did not get uploaded somehow. I'll fix that tonight.

You should see grades for each individual HW sets from 1-5, an average lab grade, and an average quiz grade. I've dropped 1 lab, 1 homework, and 2 quizzes (note that you took quiz 5 twice). Basically, this is everything you've turned in to date, except HW6 (which is still not counted late, so most of you haven't turned it in yet). Your overall average is a fair reflection of your grade going into the final.

Please pay special attention to the HW grades  - particularly with email submissions, it is possible I've missed something. Make sure you have grades for all the HW sets you turned in, and that they match what you were handed back. Let me know if you have questions or want clarification.

The rocket competition counted for 2 labs. Out of three targets, you had 9 possible shots that counted (one practice shot per target). Here's how the grading worked:

• 8-9 hits: 100%
• 6-7 hits: 95%
• 4-5 hits: 90%
• 3 hits: 85%
• 1-2 hits: 80%

Even if you didn't do that well in the competition, the grading was fairly generous. You all put in a lot of work leading up to the competition, and I didn't want to penalize any given group too badly for just having a bad day. Overall, we had 10 lab grades with one dropped, so there was not a lot of pressure to be honest. Tomorrow (Wed) I'll announce the winners of the competition.

Anyway: please check your grades carefully. In particular, if you have a zero for a homework set you know you turned in, let me know as soon as possible so we can figure out what happened.

Quiz 4 & 5 solutions

Solutions for all the quizzes are now available. 

Remaining schedule

Tomorrow (Friday) we'll finish up the rocket competition. Most of you still need to try the elevated targets, we'll have to work quickly and efficiently tomorrow to finish it up.

Next week, we'll cover chapters 18-20 on thermodynamics. Roughly speaking, Ch. 18 will be on Monday, Ch. 19 on Wednesday, and the parts of Ch. 20 we'll cover we will finish do on Friday. Chapter 19 will be largely familiar if you've had chemistry (ideal gas law and so on), and we will not cover all of chapter 20, so it is not as much material as it looks like.

If we can find a reasonable time to do so, and if there is enough interest, I will try to have a final exam review session during finals week.

Exam 4 is cancelled

If you were in class on Wednesday, you'll recall I cancelled exam 4. I think we've had enough exams at this point, and I'd rather spend the rest of our time on finishing the rocket competition and getting through the remaining material on thermodynamics. So, there is no exam Friday.

What this means is that the first three exams and the final will be weighted proportionally more. Specifically, that means the first three exams are worth 12.5% instead of 10%, and the final is worth 22.5% instead of 20%.

If you were relying on exam 4 to bring up your grade, please talk to me. I will give you the option of taking an optional exam 4 next week if you would rather proceed according to the original syllabus (4 exams worth 10% each and a final worth 20%).

Course evaluations

Please don't forget to do your course evaluations (SOI, Student Opinion of Instruction). I'll try to remember next week to set aside some time in class for you to go online and do them.

We do actually pay close attention to these surveys, and their impact is greater than you might think. Getting enough responses is critical for having meaningful data, so please do fill out the SOI surveys (you should have received an email about this). You're not wasting your time.

Exam 4

Exam 4 is this friday. Since it is only a 50 minute exam, it will be short. I will confine it to chapters 13 and 15 (gravitation and oscillations, respectively). It will be (most likely) 5 problems of which you have to solve 3.

You may safely neglect the "Einstein and gravitation", "Kepler's laws"sections as well as the "Damped simple harmonic motion" and "forced oscillations and resonance" sections for the purpose of this test, but possibly not for the final.

This week we'll talk about waves a bit more, and next week we will finish up the course talking about heat and thermodynamics.

Rocket competition

Wednesday we'll have our rocket competition after we finish going through new material. As I mentioned today, there are 3 targets you'll have to hit.

1. over level ground
2. hit a hole (about 0.2m in diameter and 0.5m above the floor)) in a vertically standing board
3. hit a hole (same hole) in a board lying flat about 0.5m above the floor

You'll have three shots at each, with one practice shot. If you hit on the practice shot but miss on one of your 'real' attempts, we'll take the best 3 out of 4. Overall this will count as 2 lab grades, scaled by how many times you hit the target.

I will specify the distance to each target and its height above the floor when applicable. You'll have a marked line that you can't cross, but you can move further back, prop up your rocket, etc., so long as you don't move closer. You can use a laser pointer to align the launcher horizontally if need be. There will be a small prize for the top 3 teams.

Oscillations of coupled masses

This is relevant to your interests.

HW6 is out

Here is HW6, it is mostly about vibrations, with a little bit on waves and gravitation thrown in. They are fairly challenging, but we'll be going over quite a few of them in class as usual. This will be your second to last homework set - planning on one more short one before dead week.

Solutions to exam 3 and HW5

Here are solutions to Exam 3 and HW5. I didn't quite get a solution typed up for #5 on HW5 (the one about the braided pipe), but you won't see anything like that on the final. I'll try to get something worked up soon.