As Exams are (Almost) Over!
This might be a little late news for most of you, since technically As exams ended last Friday, but for those who take Further Maths As, we have to do extra modules that are otherwise taken at A2 level. And since there is no A2 module exam for those are actually in As, this year I have to sit C3, M2 and S2 way after my exams are supposed to have ended and I'm back at school (other further maths students may not take this exact combination of extras, in particular many do FP1 or C4 in Year 12, which I don't do). Anyway, C3 and M2 exams have now happened and there's only S2 left on the 22nd (next Monday, which feels like an aeon). To put into perspective how late some of these exams are feeling to me, after last week, all As students went back to school to start their A2 courses.
So did I. Except that at the same time, I obviously had two exams left that week which I had to prepare for. Next week is the last week at my school for As students, before we are left to get on with any projects we have for the following two weeks. We're free to do an Extended Project Qualification and to write a report on our activities which we'll give in assemblies after those weeks are up. Or else we're free to do work experience, private learning, whatever. I'm going to be attending the Cambridge Senior Physics Challenge for a large chunk of that time myself. Of course, those paying attention will realise that the very first day 'off' that we have for our projects... is my S2 exam. Yes, after As exams ended, we went back to school AND BROKE UP AGAIN, before my exams ended. This isn't to complain, because I get ages to revise this way, and honestly I can't see a way around separating the As and A2 maths exams. But in this particular case, the S2 exam is ridiculously late in the season.
This is all to say, that now that I've (almost) finished my exams, and I think they went pretty well thank you, I have some more time to write stuff on this blog. And to start checking over the A2 specification for Physics. I won't actually upload any A2 materials until September I think, although I might if I have a large chunk of free time in the Summer Holidays (hah!) so until then all the usual revision sites are still good - PhysicsNet has brief notes, Physics&Maths tutor has worksheets and past papers, HyperPhysics has detailed notes on specific topics and Wikipedia is still woefully grim on trying to learn the basics of any science topic unless you're well versed in university level mathematics.
In the following weeks, I'm going to try to do something on this blog which I've been meaning to do for ages - which is write up notes from a series of lectures given at a nearby school by one of their physics teachers. The physics teacher in question, Dr. Low, has a PhD in theoretical physics (in string theory, actually) and went to some lengths to prepare and deliver six amazing lectures earlier this year which were highly instructive and inspiring and which I hope to cover soon. The lectures follow a similar theme to Richard Feynman's "The Character of Physical Law" lectures, which anyone reading this blog should go and watch. Now. They're 6-7 lectures which are about an hour each if I recall correctly. Dr. Low's lectures were not (I think) intended to be a follow-up to these, but they had a similar topic of what the laws of physics are like. Here's a list of the lecture titles:
Symmetry in Physical Law
The Principle of Stationary Action
Quantum Field Theory and the Standard Model of Particle Physics
The Inevitability of Physical Laws
Why is there a macroscopic universe?
Spacetime is doomed? Black holes and string theory
Since some of these lectures introduced/refreshed upon some areas of maths, my personal notes on these contain little 'maths interludes' which I will probably write up before the lecture which required them. Anything else you want to know about the lectures will probably be answered once I get around to writing them up next week.
Until then, here's a thing I made on Khan Academy:
