Midterm Review Sheet – Physics
Unit 1: Nature of Science• Scientific Method
o Observations, Predictions, Experimentation, Analysis, Conclusions
• Modeling
o What is a model?
o What are the different types of models that can be developed?
• Uncertainty
o Where does it come from?
o How do we communicate uncertainty in measured numbers?
o Rules of Significant digits for…
 Adding and subtracting
 Multiplying and dividing
• Standard Deviation
o Types of error
o What is the standard deviation?
o Understanding frequency distributions
• Units and Dimensions
• Vectors
o Ways to represent vectors
o Graphical method of addition
o Component method of addition
Unit 2: Kinematics• Scalars vs Vectors
o Direction indicated by sign
• Kinematic quantities
o Displacement and distance
o Velocity and speed
o Accleration
o Path Independent vs. Path Dependent
• Average vs Instantaneous velocity and acceleration
o Sign rules for velocity and acceleration
• Graphical analysis of displacement, velocity, and acceleration
o How can you find the velocity from the displacement graph?
o How can you find the acceleration from the acceleration graph?
o How can you find displacement form a velocity graph?
• The Big 4!! (Kinematic equations)
• Free Fall
o What is free fall?
o How does mass affect the time of free fall (if neglecting air resistance)?
o What is g?
• Projectile motiono What is a projectile?
o How do horizontal and vertical motion relate to each other?
o Know the variables that describe projectile motion.
o Vector components
o Solving projectile motion problems
Midterm Review Sheet – Physics
Unit 3: Dynamics• Forces
o Types/categories of forces
o Free-body diagrams
• Newton’s laws of motion
o First Law
 What is inertia? How is it measured?
o Second Law
o Third Law
 Be able to identify action-reaction pairs.
• Mass and weight
o Differentiate between mass, weight, and apparent weight
o Elevator problem
• Problems/Multi-body Problems
o Be able to analyze, set-up, and solve given problems.
• Friction
o What is friction?
o What are the two types of friction?
o How is friction related to the normal force? The contact surfaces?
Unit 4: Work and Energy• Work and Energy
o Types of energy
• Work-energy theorem
• Potential energy
o Gravitational
o Spring (elastic)
• Conservation of Mechanical Energy
• Conservation of Energy
Unit 5: Impulse and Momentum• What is momentum?
• What is impulse?
• Impulse-momentum theorem
• Conservation of Momentum
• Collisions
o Elastic vs. inelastic
Unit 6: Circular Motion• Centripetal acceleration
o Magnitude and direction
• Centripetal force
o Magnitude and direction
• Law of Universal Gravitation