Simple Physics

“Simple can be harder than complex: You have to work hard to get your thinking clean to make it simple. But it’s worth it in the end because once you get there, you can move mountains.” - Steve Jobs

It is easy for the students to be overwhelmed by the new concepts they encounter in their first Physics course.  Often the principles run counter to what seems intuitive in real life.  For example, friction exists in all motion, so it is logical to assume that a force is always required to produce motion and in the face of such thinking the students miss Newton's First Law of Motion.   

One of my goals for the Physics class is to break down the objectives into "Simple Ideas" - basic principles that the student can turn to and begin their thinking and then create a solution to the particular problem at hand.  But as I tell them simple does not mean easy.  Calculus is simple:  How do you describe change and what is the effect of change.  Calculus is not easy but Calculus allowed us to send human beings to the moon and back.   The actual astronauts' flight path has less turns than the students drive to school every day.  Simple.

I am not building recipes to use for the problems.  The formulas will be on the reference sheet.  I explain the formulas.  We discuss under what conditions the formulas are applicable.  At that point the student should take a deep breath, and dive into the problem and start swimming.  Even if you can't see the finish line, only by moving will you get there.

Art Scrivener