Physics |
P.N.Swamy |
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How to survive a physics course, especially Physics 211
1. Review all the sample problems in text, all the exercises worked out in class by the instructor, all the exercises worked out by tutors and all the exercises you worked on (including the submitted homework problems). Take a look at your notes, close your books, and then you should do these problems by yourself all the way through. It is important that you develop your own method of working problems and reinforce your individual style. 2. After you have done a problem, try figuring out how you will deal with the problem if some parameters are changed. This is what I would call knowing it "forwards and backwards!" 3. The moment you punch the buttons in the calculator you lose sight of the perspective in your problem and therefore you should resort to this at the end as you seek to solve a problem: You should control the calculator, never let the calculator become the master and take control of you! 4. Physics is not "plug and chug," but instead has to do with relationships between quantities. Separate a problem or a phenomenon into two pieces: the one based on developing the theory which produces a formula (sometimes this itself is important to understand; most of the times it is not) and then the application of one or more of such formulae to the problem at hand. A formula or a law states a relationship between various physical quantities. Learn to work with relationships, the symbols, and their meaning. Develop these relationships, rearrange them and work toward a solution and only at the very end, you must plug in numbers. 5. You must study an average of nine hours to survive this course. . | |