Rescheduling

After looking at the semester's schedule a bit, I have decided to adjust the schedule. Mainly I would like to cover circuits and more 'practical' matters sooner rather than later. This is partly to give you a brief interlude from the hardcore vector calculus, and partly to facilitate labs getting more interesting sooner rather than later.

Next week, we'll discuss dipoles & dielectrics (Ch. 4 Griffiths). On Friday you'll have your first exam, which will primarily cover chapter 2 in Griffiths, with a bit on dielectrics from chapter 4. More on this as it gets closer; the exam will have 3-4 problems for you to solve, much easier than the homework.

After dielectrics, we'll take a week's interlude to cover ohm's law and (non-inductive) circuits. Mathematically it should be a welcome relief. Most of this will be taught from my own notes (which you will receive), and the focus will be on analyzing and designing basic circuits.

After that week-long 'break,' it is on to magnetism and induction for about two weeks. This will give us what we need to discuss general ac circuits (damped harmonic motion from PH125 will make a return).

Exam 2 will take place during the week leading up to mid-semester study break (the Monday before the break), and it will cover magnetism and circuits. Your midterm grades, due that Wednesday, will reflect exams 1 & 2.

This is just a re-shuffling of the previous schedule (delaying magnetism by a week and moving up circuits). If any more time is needed here or there, we will 'adjust' by shortening geometric optics. Given the significant time we will spend on EM waves, geometric optics will be all but a foregone conclusion by that point.