A Day of Tests

Physics D, F and Honors Physics took their Refraction exam today and move onto Diffraction and Interference tomorrow. Intro Physics went over their Waves exam and then moved onto an exploration of sound. We reviewed the basic nature of sound waves as longitudinal, mechanical waves, factors that affected the speed of mechanical waves and then turned attention to loudness. We linked loudness with the amplitude of a sound wave and then approached the idea from the perspective of intensity, both absolute and relative. We looked at the intensity formula, which we'll practice with tomorrow, and then began to discuss the logarithmic nature of the ear's perception of sound and how that was incorporated into the decibel scale. Tomorrow, we finish with loudness, look at the range of hearing/vocalization of sounds of humans and other organisms and get a little math practice with intensity.