Maybe I shouldn't have started this blog now, not with everything that's been going on.

On the second meeting of the ninth week of classes for the third term of my mechanics lecture classes, I gave them their second quiz.

I took a page from my classes three terms ago and gave them two problems each again with ten or fifteen items requested per problem. Set at three points per number, that gave them a potential maximum of seventy five points over fifty.

One of the problems was forces in two dimensions, of course, and the other one was in projectile motion.

For the first class, I gave them a question where they had to work backwards from the velocity of a pushed object to get the acceleration and thus the summation of forces, and to derive one of the forces from there.

The projectile problem was more straightforward with initial angle and velocity given.

There was only one error in the questionnaire, where the catapult’s horizontal velocity was asked for instead of the projectile. One student thought it was a trick question, where the answer would have been zero, because the catapult does not move.

For the second class, their forces in two dimensions problem was easier where all the forces were given, they had to get the summation of forces, from there the acceleration and the velocity.

In their second problem, the horizontal distance of their target was given, and the angle that the missile launcher was stuck at. For this, as I had written on the board, they had to use solutions for system of two equations in two variables. I even went so far as to write down the four equations on the board from which they had to derive the answer.

Since the problem also included directions given in terms of clock facing, they had to convert that to standard degrees as well.

It was obvious from the start that except for a few very keen students, that most of them had a difficult time with the exam. I even had to remind some of them the difference between horizontal and vertical displacement, and ask them several time for the vertical displacement of a projectile that returned to the same height, which is zero.

In retrospect, I would just treat it as an object lesson for them not to disregard the subject as they seem to have been doing.

On to certain sidebars, there were two students who have been talking to each other during the quizzes since the very first one, sitting at one corner, under the delusion that they were inaudible, when, in fact, I could always hear them. So far though, they have not given cause for me to call their attention to their behavior, because they have always submitted their papers early and still received very low percentages in their quizzes. So there is a large likelihood that they will just fail on their own anyway, and that their attempts at cheating are ineffective.

The other subplots I’ve noticed in my mechanics will have to wait until next time, mostly involving make up exams. For now, class dismissed.