
Physics
Standards that all students are expected to achieve in the
course of their studies are unmarked.
Standards that all students should have the opportunity to learn
are marked with an asterisk (*).
Motion and Forces
- Newton's laws predict the motion of most objects. As a basis
for understanding this concept:
- Students know how to solve problems that involve
constant speed and average speed.
- Students know that when forces are balanced,
no acceleration occurs; thus an object continues to move
at a constant speed or stays at rest (Newton's first law).
- Students know how to apply the law F=ma to solve
one-dimensional motion problems that involve constant forces
(Newton's second law).
- Students know that when one object exerts a force
on a second object, the second object always exerts a force
of equal magnitude and in the opposite direction (Newton's
third law).
- Students know the relationship between the universal
law of gravitation and the effect of gravity on an object
at the surface of Earth.
- Students know applying a force to an object perpendicular
to the direction of its motion causes the object to change
direction but not speed (e.g., Earth's gravitational force
causes a satellite in a circular orbit to change direction
but not speed).
- Students know circular motion requires the application
of a constant force directed toward the center of the circle.
- * Students know Newton's laws are not exact but
provide very good approximations unless an object is moving
close to the speed of light or is small enough that quantum
effects are important.
- * Students know how to solve two-dimensional
trajectory problems.
- * Students know how to resolve two-dimensional
vectors into their components and calculate the magnitude
and direction of a vector from its components.
- * Students know how to solve two-dimensional
problems involving balanced forces (statics).
- * Students know how to solve problems in circular
motion by using the formula for centripetal acceleration
in the following form: a=v2/r.
- * Students know how to solve problems involving
the forces between two electric charges at a distance (Coulomb's
law) or the forces between two masses at a distance (universal
gravitation).
Conservation of Energy and Momentum
- The laws of conservation of energy and momentum provide a
way to predict and describe the movement of objects. As a basis
for understanding this concept:
- Students know how to calculate kinetic energy
by using the formula E=(1/2)mv2
.
- Students know how to calculate changes in gravitational
potential energy near Earth by using the formula (change
in potential energy) =mgh (h is the change in the elevation).
- Students know how to solve problems involving
conservation of energy in simple systems, such as falling
objects.
- Students know how to calculate momentum as the
product mv.
- Students know momentum is a separately conserved
quantity different from energy.
- Students know an unbalanced force on an object
produces a change in its momentum.
- Students know how to solve problems involving
elastic and inelastic collisions in one dimension by using
the principles of conservation of momentum and energy.
- * Students know how to solve problems involving
conservation of energy in simple systems with various sources
of potential energy, such as capacitors and springs.
Heat and Thermodynamics
- Energy cannot be created or destroyed, although in many processes
energy is transferred to the environment as heat. As a basis
for understanding this concept:
- Students know heat flow and work are two forms
of energy transfer between systems.
- Students know that the work done by a heat engine
that is working in a cycle is the difference between the
heat flow into the engine at high temperature and the heat
flow out at a lower temperature (first law of thermodynamics)
and that this is an example of the law of conservation of
energy.
- Students know the internal energy of an object
includes the energy of random motion of the object's atoms
and molecules, often referred to as thermal energy. The
greater the temperature of the object, the greater the energy
of motion of the atoms and molecules that make up the object.
- Students know that most processes tend to decrease
the order of a system over time and that energy levels are
eventually distributed uniformly.
- Students know that entropy is a quantity that
measures the order or disorder of a system and that this
quantity is larger for a more disordered system.
- * Students know the statement "Entropy tends
to increase" is a law of statistical probability that
governs all closed systems (second law of thermodynamics).
- * Students know how to solve problems involving
heat flow, work, and efficiency in a heat engine and know
that all real engines lose some heat to their surroundings.
Waves
- Waves have characteristic properties that do not depend on
the type of wave. As a basis for understanding this concept:
- Students know waves carry energy from one place
to another.
- Students know how to identify transverse and
longitudinal waves in mechanical media, such as springs
and ropes, and on the earth (seismic waves).
- Students know how to solve problems involving
wavelength, frequency, and wave speed.
- Students know sound is a longitudinal wave whose
speed depends on the properties of the medium in which it
propagates.
- Students know radio waves, light, and X-rays
are different wavelength bands in the spectrum of electromagnetic
waves whose speed in a vacuum is approximately 3×108
m/s (186,000 miles/second).
- Students know how to identify the characteristic
properties of waves: interference (beats), diffraction,
refraction, Doppler effect, and polarization.
Electric and Magnetic Phenomena
- Electric and magnetic phenomena are related and have many
practical applications. As a basis for understanding this concept:
- Students know how to predict the voltage or current
in simple direct current (DC) electric circuits constructed
from batteries, wires, resistors, and capacitors.
- Students know how to solve problems involving
Ohm's law.
- Students know any resistive element in a DC circuit
dissipates energy, which heats the resistor. Students can
calculate the power (rate of energy dissipation) in any
resistive circuit element by using the formula Power = IR
(potential difference) × I (current) = I2R.
- Students know the properties of transistors and
the role of transistors in electric circuits.
- Students know charged particles are sources of
electric fields and are subject to the forces of the electric
fields from other charges.
- Students know magnetic materials and electric
currents (moving electric charges) are sources of magnetic
fields and are subject to forces arising from the magnetic
fields of other sources.
- Students know how to determine the direction
of a magnetic field produced by a current flowing in a straight
wire or in a coil.
- Students know changing magnetic fields produce
electric fields, thereby inducing currents in nearby conductors.
- Students know plasmas, the fourth state of matter,
contain ions or free electrons or both and conduct electricity.
- * Students know electric and magnetic fields
contain energy and act as vector force fields.
- * Students know the force on a charged particle
in an electric field is qE, where E is the electric field
at the position of the particle and q is the charge of the
particle.
- * Students know how to calculate the electric
field resulting from a point charge.
- * Students know static electric fields have as
their source some arrangement of electric charges.
- * Students know the magnitude of the force on
a moving particle (with charge q) in a magnetic field is
qvB sin(a), where a is the angle between v and B (v and
B are the magnitudes of vectors v and B, respectively),
and students use the right-hand rule to find the direction
of this force.
- * Students know how to apply the concepts of
electrical and gravitational potential energy to solve problems
involving conservation of energy.