Dot Physics

Physics Textbook

Posted by Rhett Allain on February 5, 2010
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The following is a collection of some of my posts that can be put into a simple and quick textbook-type thingy. I am not really sure you would call this a textbook, but maybe you would. This does not include everything you would normally find in a traditional textbook, but clearly it is not traditional. I tried to keep it to just the fundamental ideas. As I write more stuff that is appropriate, I will add it.

In terms of the level of this material, I would think it would be appropriate for advanced high school physics or introductory college-level physics.

I plan to update this list with examples (from Dot Physics and other sites) as they relate to the topics. This will take time though. Maybe in the future, I will put this together as a pdf or ebook format or something.

One final note, if you find this useful and actually use it in some way, please let me know (by adding a comment or sending me an email.

Update:

I have started correctly tagging all my old posts. What does this mean? This means that if you want some examples – you have it. For instance, if you want some example posts that deal with projectile motion, here are posts that are tagged “projectile motion”. Now, I admit that sometimes it is not really what you want (look at vectors) – but I think it adds a lot more.

Not sure if this is the BEST order to read through these. In fact, you may just read the ones you find useful. Really, I still don’t know exactly the best way to use these but I wanted to put them in some organized manner. Hopefully, I will be able to add more topics, like electricity and magnetism stuff.

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Comments

  1. #1 josh g.
    February 5, 2010

    I don’t think I’d need anything in printable form, but I’m definitely bookmarking this specific page so that I can jump back to find relevant posts quickly when I’m tutoring or substitute-teaching a related lesson.

  2. #2 Fzzxtchr
    February 5, 2010

    Mr. Allain,

    First, thanks so much for posting this. I’m going to recommend this post to my students. I’m doing a project at the beginning of our semester in which they are building (the basics of) an online textbook. I think your posts will be useful for them to use as a reference if you don’t mind them doing that.

    Secondly, if you happen to have any feedback on our wiki (https://thescienceclassroom.wikispaces.com/Our+Classroom+Textbook), I’d really appreciate it. Our students are doing this project for the first time and are really just trying to build the backbone of an online textbook, so be gentle!

    Thirdly, I’m a fellow Louisianian, but I’ve been transplanted to Oklahoma for the last several years. Glad to see someone blogging and teaching physics. I’m excited to find your blog and have you in my feed reader. At some point through the year, I would be interested in discussing the possibility of you skyping into my classroom, if you are into that kind of thing. I try to expose my HS students to college physics wherever possible. Let me know if you think that’s a possiblity.

  3. #3 Rhett Allain
    February 5, 2010

    @Fzzxtchr,

    That looks like an interesting project for your class. I will be curious to see how it turns out. I will check it out. I will be happy to help out in anyway that I can.

  4. #4 Erik Jensen
    February 5, 2010

    Many thanks for making these available. I teach introductory college physics courses online and I will include these as optional resources for my students.

  5. #5 Jennifer
    February 6, 2010

    I just wanted to thank you for all these helpful posts on the basics of physics. I’ve been reading them for a while but never got around to commenting. I’m trying to transfer my major to physics but my background in it is pretty lacking (I’ve been teaching myself most of the basics – I stole my dad’s old university textbooks but his most basic one is the Feynman Lectures which, while quite good, doesn’t have quite the kind of examples I’m looking for) so things like this are a huge help.

  6. #6 Jim Rothwell
    February 11, 2010

    Rhett,

    Thank you for posting these. I teach high school physics and have been compiling a list of helpful links for my students and putting them on a classroom website along with my notes. Many of your posts have been included, starting with .P for DotPhysics. You do an excellent job describing concepts.

    http://www.lchsyes.org/rothwell