This Week in AP Physics
Our unit 3 test on mass, force, gravity, gravitational fields, and Newton’s laws is Monday. (If you kept homework 4 to study from, please be sure to turn that in before you take your test.) On Tuesday at the start of class your lab report for the Newton’s second law experiment is due. Please remember to share it with me at [email protected]. By 3:00 on Tuesday please also be sure to upload it to TurnItIn.com. On Tuesday we will begin unit 4 on energy. At some point in the week we will also complete the short experiment, Friction and Vector Analysis of Forces.

This Week in Physics
We will begin our unit on force and Newton’s laws this week. Please take notes on Podcast 1 – Net External Force, Podcast 2 – Weight, and Podcast 3 – Normal Force for Monday. Through Monday and Tuesday we will cover these topics and do assignment 1 followed by a quiz as announced. When announced please take notes on Podcast 4 – Introduction to Friction, Podcast 5 – Static Friction, and Podcast 6 – Kinetic Friction. This will lead us into assignment 2 and our experiment on friction.

This Week in Astronomy
We will continue to work on our unit on the moon by collecting and analyzing a lot of data related to the moon phases and Earth-Sun-Moon alignments. A great website to use as we practices is Lunar Phases Interactive. In addition, Podcast 1 – Introduction and Orbit, Podcast 2 – Lunar Phases and their Appearances, and Podcast 3 – The Phases and their Timings will support your efforts. Expect a quiz at some point this week as announced. Finally, please remember to work on your Unit 2 – Outdoor Lab. This lab requires you to take multiple observations at the same time of day for multiple days. Be sure to start it right away, since you’ll need to find five sunny days. Because this is Cleveland, we’ll need some time. This lab is therefore due on November 17.

Cool Science of the Week
Did you know that rainbows aren’t actually acrs? They only look like arcs because of our ground-based view of them. It turns out the ground cuts off our view of their full form, and if we were higher up, such as in an airplane or helicopter, we would see them in their full form: a circle! Check out this beautiful photograph taken from a helicopter! (Note that it’s also a double rainbow. When light bounces inside of a raindrop once, it makes a rainbow. When it bounces twice, it makes a wider but dimmer rainbow.)