Intermediate Mechanics Tutorials

Sponsored in part by NSF grants DUE-0441426 and DUE-0442388.

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Tutorials | Course Syllabi | Workshops | Research

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Course syllabi

It is, of course, impossible to recreate another instructor's course exactly. But, recognizing the difficulty in implementing a course in Intermediate Mechanics using our Tutorials, we have presented several syllabi to show ways in which materials can be structured to best meet student and instructor needs.

Starting with damping forces

These syllabi follow (basically) the chapter headings of Fowles and Cassiday.

• with phase space, without Lagrangians
• without phase space, with Lagrangians

Starting with conservative energy

When students are taking a differential equations course as a co-requisitive, it might be easier to start with material built on vector calculus, typical to a Calc III course. These syllabi follow such a course, requiring that one rearrange (for example) the order in which chapters from Fowles and Cassiday are used in the course.

• without phase space or Lagrangians
• without phase space, with Lagrangians

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Intermediate Mechanics Tutorials are modeled after

• Tutorials in Introductory Physics, L.C. McDermott, P.S. Shaffer, and the Physics Education Group at the U. of Washington (Prentice Hall, 2002)
• Activity-Based Tutorials, M.C. Wittmann, R.N. Steinberg, E.F. Redish, and the University of Maryland Physics Education Research Group (Wiley, 2004 and 2005)

Contact Information Bradley S. Ambrose Department of Physics Grand Valley State University Grand Rapids, MI tel: 616-331-2524 Email: ambroseb@gvsu.edu

Michael C. Wittmann Department of Physics and Astronomy 5709 Bennett Hall University of Maine Orono ME 04401-5709 tel: 207 - 581 - 1237 fax: 207 - 581 - 3410 email: wittmann@umit.maine.edu