Download The Study Guide

THE GREAT T2 PHYSICS COMMON ASSESSMENT STUDY GUIDE
Contents:
1. Exam Breakdown………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….. Page 1
2. Studying and test-taking strategies………………………………………………………………………………………………………….Page 2
3. Big Ideas from Each Topic ……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….Page 3
a. Unit 4 – Momentum……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………Page 3
b. Unit 5 – Energy……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………Page 3
c. Unit 6 – Thermodynamics……………………………………………………………………………………………………………Page 4
d. Unit 7 – Electrostatics………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….Page 5
e. Unit 7½ - Uniform Circular Motion ……………………………………………………………………………………………..Page 5
f. Cumulative Topics – Kinematics and Universal Gravitation…………………………………………………………..Page6
4. Table of variables and standard units
5. Common conversions
The Common Assessment Breakdown:
 45 multiple choice, 90 minutes (2 minutes / question)
 2 Free Response questions, 45 minutes
o 1 lab-based
o 1 cumulative
Multiple Choice Breakdown by Topic:
Unit
Topic (Objectives)
4 – Momentum
5 – Energy
6 – Thermodynamics
7 – Electrostatics
7½ – Uniform Circular Motion
CUMULATIVE REVIEW
# of
Questions
4.1: Momentum
4.2: Impulse
4.3: Conservation of Momentum
5.1: Types of Energy and their Transformations
5.2: Conservation of Energy
5.3: Work
5.4: Power
6.1: Methods of Heat Transfer
6.2: Laws of Thermodynamics
6.3: Energetic Properties of Matter
6.4: Specific Heat, Latent Heat, and Thermal Equilibrium
5.1: Electric Charge
5.2: Coulomb’s Law
5.3: Electric Fields
5.4: Electric Potential and Work
7½.1: Tangential Velocity and Centripetal Acceleration
7½.2: Applications of UCM
1.1: One-Dimensional Kinematics
3.2: Universal Gravitation
Studying Strategies:
Principle 1: Manage Your Time!
I recommend studying physics for an hour per night (including weekends) each day from now until the Common
Assessment. That gives you five evenings to review- one night per unit on the exam.
6
6
6
6
3
4
4
4
6
Principle 2: Focus!
How do you study best? Do you best study alone or with others (be honest with yourself about how much work you get
done with friends or significant others!)? Do you prefer to study while listening to music, collaboratively working with
others, or in a silent environment? Determine your ideal studying style and find a way to maximize this studying! Don’t
study at your computer where Facebook or Twitter can distract you! Don’t study in front of the TV! Whether you
hibernate in your room, sit at your kitchen table, head to the library, or claim a table at Starbucks, eliminate distractions.
Determine where you’ll study, when you’ll study, who you’ll study with, and stick to it!
Principle 3: Be Tactful!
Don’t try to study everything at once. It’s overwhelming, and you won’t be as successful! Pick one major unit or topic to
study each day, and only review that topic. You’ll be more focused, and get more practice on a specific objective. A
common strategy I used while studying in college was figuring out what I didn’t know, reviewing that first, and leaving
the concepts I knew easily for last. How you can apply this strategy right now: 1) Review your past exams and end-ofunit reflections; 2) identify your weakest topics; and 3) focus your studying on those topics.
Principle 4: Keep your brain calm!
Your brain operates better when you’ve had a good night’s sleep. Experts recommend 8 hours. Your realistic physics
teacher who spent far too many late nights at the library cramming for finals recommends a minimum of 6 hours.
Furthermore, don’t study anything the day of the test! Don’t stress yourself out cramming during lunch right before the
Common Exam. Use that time to alleviate some stress: eat a healthy lunch, get some exercise at activity time to increase
endorphins and lower stress levels, listen to music to focus yourself, and just come into the test with a positive attitude.
A calm, collected, and ready-to-problem-solve mind can make all the difference after a long week of testing!
Test-Taking Strategies:
Principle 1: Go with What You Know!
There will be problems that you don’t have any idea how to solve right away. There will be problems that you look at
and you feel as though you can solve it in your sleep. Solve those easy problems first! Each problem—no matter the
difficulty level—is worth the same amount of points on the multiple choice section. Solving simpler problems you
definitely can solve first and skipping the ones you find challenging will help boost your self-esteem early in the test, and
maximize your score.
Principle 2: If all else fails part 1: GUESS!
There will be problems that you look at and they seem foreign. If you rack your brain and can’t determine the concept
the question is assessing, a great strategy before you just bubble a random answer is to GUESS. Identify your Givens.
Identify your Unknowns. Look for the Equation corresponding to the variables you know and the one you want.
Substitute and Solve!
Principle 3: If all else fails part 2: guess!
There’s five minutes left of the test, and you have 12 unanswered questions. AH! At this point, pick one remaining
question you feel most comfortable with to try and work through, but before you finish that one question, guess and
bubble answers for the rest! There’s no penalty for guessing on Common Assessments, and while I want 100% of you to
finish with time leftover to check your answers and then take a nap, I know that may not be realistic for everyone. So
make sure at the end of the test, no question goes unanswered.
Principle 4: Never give up. Never surrender!
Attempt all problems, and never settle for “I don’t know,” or “I don’t care.” Especially on Free Response, you receive
partial credit for correct setup, equations, and even units! Even if you feel like you don’t understand a problem, work
your way through! It’s training your brain- just keep at it!
Major Topics, the Big Ideas, and Practice Problems
This section is to help you study by objective. After you identify your weakest topics, use this guide to review most
important concepts. Then study problems on your notes and from homework on that topic (all copies of filled in notes
will be posted online at http://ypsephysics.wordpress.com), and then complete the practice problems on the 2011-12 T2
Common Assessment and re-take exams on your own (all solutions will also be posted online at the URL above). If you
still struggle with the practice problems, check out online tutorials from https://www.khanacademy.org/science/physics
(great for AP Level 4 or AP Level 5 problems!) or http://physicsclassroom.com!
Unit 4: Momentum
Topic: 4.1
Momentum
Problems to work:
7
The Big Ideas
 Momentum is how difficult an object is to stop
 Momentum = Mass x Velocity
Topic: 4.2
Impulse
Problems to work:
29, 31
The Big Ideas
 Impulse is an object’s change in momentum
 Impulse = final momentum – initial momentum
 Impulse = mass x change in velocity = force x time
Topic: 4.3
Conservation of
Momentum
Problems to
Work: 5, 21, 23
The Big Ideas
 Any time an object collides with another object, this involves conservation of momentum
 Momentum lost by one object is gained by another object
 The impulse one object experiences is equal and opposite to the impulse of the other object
 The total momentum is the same before and after the collision
 When two objects stick together, or collide perfectly inelastically, they have the same final
velocity
Unit 5: Energy
Topic: 5.1 – Types
of Energy
Problems to
Work: 13 (step 1),
22, 30, 33
The Big Ideas
 Energy is the ability of an object to do work
 Potential gravitational energy is energy an object has due to height
 Potential elastic energy is energy an object has while being stretched or compressed
 Kinetic energy is energy an object has due to motion
 The sum of an object’s kinetic and potential energies is its total mechanical energy
Topic 5.2 –
Conservation of
Energy
Problems to
Work: 10, 16, 23,
24, 44
The Big Ideas
 Energy cannot be created or destroyed, only transformed to other types of energy
 When work is not done (i.e. lifting or pushing an object) and heat is not released (i.e.
friction), the total mechanical of an object is constant
 Change in energy of an object is equal to the heat absorbed plus work done on the object
Topic 5.3 – Work
Problems to
Work: 26, 28, 34
The Big Ideas
 Work is an object’s change in energy when heat remains constant
 When an object is accelerated by an outside force, work = change in kinetic energy
 When an object is lifted, work = change in potential energy
Topic 5.4 – Power
Problems to
Work: 34, 43
The Big Ideas
 Power is the rate at which energy is used
 Power = force x velocity = work / time
Unit 6: Thermodynamics
Topic: 6.1 –
Methods of Heat
Transfer
The Big Ideas
 Conduction is the transfer of heat through the collisions of particles, most often in solids
Problems to
Work: 6, 20, 40


Convection is the transfer of heat through the expansion of particles, most often in liquids
and gases
Radiation is the transfer of heat through waves directly from energy sources
Topic: 6.2 – The
Laws of
Thermodynamics
Problems to
Work: 26, 38
The Big Ideas
 The Zeroth Law of Thermodynamics states that when a hot object placed next to a cool
object, heat will transfer from the hot object to the cool object until they reach thermal
equilibrium (the same temperature)
 The First Law of Thermodynamics is the Law of Conservation of Energy
o To change the internal energy of an object, it can either absorb or release heat, do
work, or have work done on it
 The Second Law of Thermodynamics is the Law of Entropy.
o Entropy is the amount of disorder in a system
o High entropy makes it harder to do work, making engines less efficient
o Entropy in the universe is always increasing
 The Third Law of Thermodynamics states that as an object approaches absolute zero, its
entropy will become zero; however, nothing can reach this temperature since objects must
always have some kinetic energy
 Over one or more cycles of an engine, its change in internal energy equals zero:
o 0 = Qabsorbed + W + Qreleased
Topic: 6.3 –
Energetic
Properties of
Matter
Problems to
Work: 2, 3
The Big Ideas
 Solids have the lowest entropy and lowest energy
 Gases have the greatest entropy and greatest energy
 When substances are increasing temperature, they are increasing kinetic energy
 When substances are changing phase, they are increasing potential energy
Topic: 6.4 –
Specific Heat,
Latent Heat, and
Thermal
Equilibrium
Problems to
Work: 8, 13 (2nd
step), 15, 39
The Big Ideas
 Specific heat capacity is the amount of energy required to raise 1 g of a substance by 1°C
 Latent heat is the amount of energy required to change the phase of 1 g of a substance
o Fusion = solid  liquid
o Vaporization = liquid  gas
 For a system exchanging heat with its surroundings, the heat lost by the system is gained by
the surroundings until the two reach thermal equilibrium
Unit 7: Electrostatics
Topic: 7.1 –
Electric Charge
Problems to
Work: 24, 52, 53
The Big Ideas
 Charge is an imbalance of protons and electrons
o More electrons than protons = negative
o More protons than electrons = positive
 Like charges repel; opposite charges attract
 Conductors transfer charge easily and have a large number of free electrons
 Insulators do not transfer charge easily and have a small number of free electrons
 When charging via friction, electrons move from a less electronegative object to a more
electronegative object
 When charging via conduction on objects of equal size, electrons diffuse from the more
negative object to the less negative object until the two have even charge density
Topic: 7.2 –
Coulomb’s Law
Problems to
Work: 45, 46, 47
The Big Ideas
 Electrostatic forces are directly proportional to charge and inversely proportional to the
square of the distance separating them.
Topic: 7.3 –
Electric Fields
Problems to
Work: 48, 49
The Big Ideas
 Electric fields are to electrostatic forces as acceleration is to gravitational forces
 Electric field is the force per unit charge a positive charge would experience in a space
 Electric field lines point from positive charges to negative charges
 Electric field lines indicate the direction a positive charge would experience a force
 A greater density of field lines indicate a stronger electric field
Topic: 7.4 –
Electric Potential
and Work
Problems to
Work: 50, 51
The Big Ideas


Electric potential is the energy per unit charge a positive charge would experience in a space
Equipotential lines run perpendicular to electric field lines
Unit 7½: Uniform Circular Motion
Topic: Centripetal
Acceleration and
Tangential
Velocity
Problems to
Work: 1, 12, 18,
41
The Big Ideas
 Centripetal acceleration changes the direction of an object’s velocity
 Centripetal acceleration always points toward the center of a circle
 Tangential velocity always points in the direction an object would fly off a circle
Review:
Topic: 3.2 –
Universal
Gravitation
Problems to
Work: 14, 19, 35,
36
The Big Ideas
 Gravitational force is an object’s weight
 The gravitational force is directly proportional to object’s masses and inversely proportional
to the square of the distance between them
 Gravitational forces are always attractive
Topic: 1.1 – One
Dimensional
Kinematics
Problems to
Work: 1, 34, 54,
55
The Big Ideas
 Displacement, velocity, and acceleration are vectors that have both magnitude and direction
 Distance and speed are scalars that do not have direction
 Velocity is the rate of change of displacement. Acceleration is the rate of change of velocity.
 Problems can be solved using a dvivfat table
Common Variables, their Symbols, and Standard Units
Variable
Time
Displacement
Velocity
Acceleration
Mass
Force
Momentum
Impulse
Energy
Work
Heat
Power
Charge
Electric Field
Electric Potential
Symbol
t
d
v
a
m
F
p
J
KE, PE
W
Q
P
q
E
V
Common Metric Conversions
cm  m: divide by 100
km  m: multiply by 1000
g  kg: divide by 1000
kN  N: multiply by 1000
kJ  J: multiply by 1000
µC  C: multiply by 10-6
Unit
Seconds (s)
Meters (m)
Meters / Second (m/s)
Meters / Second2 (m/s2)
Kilograms (kg)
Newtons (N)
Kilograms*meters per second (kg m/s)
Kilograms*meters per second (kg m/s)
Joules (J)
Joules (J)
Joules (J)
Watts (W)
Coulomb (C)
Newtons / Coulomb (N/C)
Volts (V)