I looked back today, and something appears to have happened. The College Board now has a full-fledged web page with FAQs, PDFs, and even a non-YouTube video.
AP Physics 1 and AP Physics 2
Here's the preamble:
"Guided by National Research Council and National Science Foundation recommendations, the AP Program spent several years collaborating with master AP teachers and eminent educators from universities and colleges to evaluate and revise the AP Physics B course. This collaboration led to a decision to replace AP Physics B with two new courses, AP Physics 1: Algebra-based and AP Physics 2: Algebra-based. The new courses were endorsed enthusiastically by higher education officials and will benefit all members of the AP community. AP will begin offering the eagerly awaited courses in the 2014–15 academic year, and it will discontinue the AP Physics B program following the 2013–14 academic year."
As I feared, AP Physics 1 is essentially "All Mechanics All The Time" (with a toe-dip into electricity).
AP Physics 2 is "Everything Else".
Given the extent to which AP Physics 1 is a Modeler's Paradise, and the propensity of so many high school physics teachers to dwell in the realm of mechanics, I wonder if a market for AP Physics 2 will ever materialize. And if it does, how long that market will remain viable for the College Board. I foresee many high schools offering AP Physics 1 alongside their traditional physics course—both intended for seniors. There will be no place for AP Physics 2.
I don't see a bright future for AP Physics at my own school. Implementing an AP Physics 1-2 sequence would institute the kind of tracking we've avoided by eschewing any "honors" or "accelerated" science classes. Isolating the best and brightest from the rest of the student population in a first-year course is not the way to go. Our current Physics 1 course is nicely heterogeneous while not "unchallenging" to our top students.
I presume there's been some attempt to align Physics 1 with NGSS as a practical matter. NGSS seems to have left electric circuits out, so it's curious to see them in as the token non-mechanics item in AP Physics 1.
Jump to AP Physics C? We really don't have a sufficient population of phyz-excited students who have also completed AP Calculus AB as sophomores or juniors.
Then again, if AP Physics is abandoned, a year's worth of robust curriculum is also lost. AP Bio, AP Chem, and our new AP Environmental Science will soldier on with one fewer competitor in the market. I can't get excited about such a marginalization of physics.
I'll need some time (and inspiration) to find a path worth following.
4 comments:
Dean,
AP Physics 1 is mechanics + sound + basic circuits for multiple reasons:
1 - AP Physics 1 is designed to allow folks to add topics they want to add. You may want to add light because you really like optics and waves. You might choose to add 20th century physics because you are passionate about it. You may choose to add other topics because you state REQUIRES a state test on those topics.
2 - if 1 semester didn't cover both linear and rotational mechanics, 1 semester wouldn't be accepted by many colleges.
3 - colleges do want both linear and rotational mechanics.
I think much of this is fairly well laid out on the ap central website.
have a good one.
Paul Lulai
Thanks Paul.
This is a developing story and I'm likely to get aspects of it wrong as I navigate through it.
You make it sound as if AP Physics 1 is very pliable. Teachers can tailor it with this or that favorite topic. In my experience, pressures from students, parents, administrators and even teachers push the "this and that" out to allow deeper focus on the material covered on the exam. Other topics are interesting in the opinion of the instructor, but the clients are here to put 5s on their transcripts.
More importantly, if AP Physics 1 is at all cafeteria style, who on Earth will be beating a path to the door of AP Physics 2?
High school students should get a year of biology, a year of chemistry, and a year of physics. Schools then offer AP's in those sciences. It's a tough sell to tell a student, "Congrats on your outstanding achievement in AP Physics. What say you follow it up with some outstanding achievement in... AP Physics?"
We only have them for four years, and they've got other things to do. Sure, some students follow Calculus AB with BC, but that's in the core subject of math.
I just don't see a viable market for AP Physics 2. Which is sad, because that's where most of the grooviest topics are.
And while I can understand the full-on Mechanics that is AP1, I scratch my head at the inclusion of electric circuits (even an introduction) in AP1.
Colleges may well want linear and rotational mechanics for semester equivalence; I get that. Were they beating a drum for inclusion of electric circuits, too? Because that would surprise me. And I often enjoy surprises.
Notable exception: seeing talk (on the APB EDG forum of covering the whole of AP1 and AP2 in a single school year. That scores a face palm!
As a student that went through a school with multiple tracks, I'm curious. Could you say more about your objections to having honors/advanced courses for students that want them?
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