Essential one-year physics curriculum

Abstract

In the rural school settings of Northeast Wisconsin, many teachers begin to teach physics without complete licensure, training in classical physics, or knowledge of best-practice principles in the physics field. This creates a need to answer the question: What then, should these teachers be teaching to know with confidence that they are preparing their students for college to the best of their ability? This project went to the best available source-introductory level college and university professors-to find answers to that question. Data was gathered from physics instructors on what they teach in freshman physics to create a data-driven, one year curriculum correlated with national science standards, and also correlated with the 4 most common high school physics textbooks. This document is intended to be the starting point for rural teachers in building curriculum to meet the needs of students preparing for college. Based on this study, to prepare students for post-secondary physics courses, a one-year rural high school physics course should include: Math Review, Motion in one and two dimensions, Forces in one and two dimensions, Rotational motion, Momentum, Energy, work, and simple machines, Vibrations and waves, Static electricity, Electrical forces and fields, Current electricity, Series and parallel circuits and Magnetism.