Intuitive Physics

An Introduction to Physics Applications of Your Everyday Life

Disclaimer: this work is not finalized and is still in development.

Course Type:

This will be a standard 3-credit, lecture-style course with a partially flipped classroom.

Mission Statement:

This course is designed to break down basic physics principles in relation to what students see and interact with every day. This will arm students with the ability to explain physics to others and build tangible intuition.

The focus will be on intuition and overall behavior and scaling rather than the numerical details.

Prerequisites:

• Calculus 1

• Introductory Physics 1

• Introductory Physics 2 (Corequisite)

Goals:

At the end of this course, students shall be able to identify, describe, and explain the important concepts surrounding the physics of:

• Body and medicine

• Motion and various sports

• Flight, Flow, Drag, and Lift

• Light and Waves

• Everyday Technology

• Energy, heat, and other phenomena

Modules

Assessments

• Assignments:

  • There will be six homework assignments where students explain an instance of the physics covered in the given module that they observe and how the environment in which they observe it affects its behavior. 

  • Classes will have clicker questions dispersed throughout the guided, scaffolded problems focusing on the behavior of certain phenomena. Attendance will not be taken, and clicker questions will be scaled to account for a reasonable amount of excused absences.

• Final Project:

  • Students pick a phenomenon they encounter (that isn't covered in class) and have a final presentation explaining the physics intuitively, with minimal math.