Doin' Science

Chapter 1 of every book is a quick taste of techniques and tools to do the work in that field. Today, Introductory Physics wandered through the scientific method and the Physics/Honors Physics folks looked at measurements.

Intro Physics started class off by going over their Making Cents of Math lab. We looked at the importance of linear relationships and the meaning of slopes and then spent time thinking about information that would be relevant for the conclusion section of the lab. If, when we go over a lab in class, you find that you want to add information or re-write a section, just let me know before you hand it in and the deadline can be extended to accommodate the extra work. Then it was our old friend, the scientific method. The steps of the scientific method were reviewed and linked to how science is conducted in the real world. Tomorrow, we'll start our walk through making and evaluating measurements, with emphasis on the metric system and converting metric units. Have those calculators ready!

Physics and Honors Physics took on the task of contrasting accuracy and precision and describing how significant figures provide information about the precision of a measurement. Be clear about the definitions of accuracy and precision and that precision is limited by the construction of the measuring took, whereas accuracy suffers from limitations that can often be remedied such as problems with the measuring device and human error. We also took time to detail how to assess the number of significant figures in a reported value, how to ascribe the correct number of SF's to a measurement and how to report answers from calculations using the appropriate number of significant figures. The homework tonight will allow you a bit more practice with his and will let you also get your hands a little dirtier with unit conversions. Hint - think very carefully about how to go from cm³ to m³. It is not quite as straightforward as you think...