Use the science to investigate a real source, explain the evidence, and communicate a defensible conclusion. The guide supplies the actual reading, data, task, and chosen level before the unit begins.
| Strand | Required evidence |
|---|---|
| History, Reading, Writing | Use an approved source in context and a student-authored response. Separate the original evidence from later explanations; do not force a single-hero story. |
| Geography and ethics | Include location, social context, or ethical trade-offs where they genuinely support the scientific question. |
| Elective extensions | Choose additional depth in data, technology, economics, or art. Extensions do not replace the core work. |
| Quantitative science | Use the unit's mathematical lane at the agreed level. Supply units, denominators, and model conditions; required science is assessed as science. |
Integration is reported separately and cannot lower the science grade or block a science demonstration pass. Science and practical criteria determine that pass.
Use the same approved task in both formats. The web guide explains the source, data, assumptions, student work, and evidence checklist; this packet is its portable summary, not a different assignment.
Use the web guide's approved unit assignment.
| Unit | Physics big idea | Integration anchor |
|---|---|---|
| 01 Kinematics & Motion | Motion models require initial conditions and a reference frame. | Use Galileo's ramp investigation: from rest at constant acceleration, displacement follows time squared. Position-time slope gives velocity; distance-time slope gives speed. |
| 02 Dynamics & Newton’s Laws | A net force changes motion; with no net force, motion never changes at all (inertia). | Newton’s Principia and the three laws of motion — and the free-body diagram becomes the physicist’s core tool. |
| 03 Circular Motion & Gravitation | Turning and orbiting need a center-seeking force; gravity falls off with the square of the distance. | Kepler’s planetary data and Newton uniting the heavens with the falling apple; pair with Longitude — one inverse-square law holds the Moon and drops a stone. |
| 04 Energy & Work | Work transfers energy; energy is never lost, only moved from one form into another. | Joule, Watt, and the age of the steam engine — measuring energy and power; the horsepower that drove the Industrial Revolution. |
| 05 Momentum & Collisions | A system's momentum is conserved when net external impulse is zero or negligible. | Rocketry and recoil: define the system, include expelled mass where appropriate, and justify the conservation model. |
| 06 Simple Harmonic Motion | Ideal SHM has a restoring force proportional and opposite to displacement; the simple-pendulum model requires small angles. | Galileo, Huygens, and timekeeping; test how the period depends on length, mass, and the model assumptions. |
| 07 Torque & Rotational Motion | Torque turns things; a lever trades force for distance about a pivot point. | Levers from Archimedes’ “give me a place to stand” to the machine age; pair with The Way Things Work — every machine is a handful of these ideas combined. |
| 08 Fluids & Pressure | Pressure pushes in every direction; buoyancy and flow follow simple, predictable laws. | Archimedes in the bath, Pascal on pressure, and Bernoulli on flow — from crowns to hydraulics to the physics of flight. |
Test constant-acceleration motion released from rest. Measure displacement from the release point and plot it against time squared; the fitted slope represents a/2, not a. State the effects of initial motion, rolling inertia, and losses. Connect the measurement to an approved Galileo excerpt without claiming that a ramp changes gravity itself.
Math never drives a unit, but physics uses it constantly — always anchored to the reaction or measurement at the bench. Here is the quantitative skill each unit actually uses, done inside the lab context rather than as a parallel curriculum.
| Unit | Applied math at the agreed level |
|---|---|
| 01 Kinematics | Constant acceleration: displacement = initial velocity × time + ½at². From rest, a displacement-versus-time-squared slope is a/2. Position-time slope gives velocity; speed-time area gives distance. |
| 02 Dynamics & Newton’s Laws | Net F = ma in an inertial frame for constant mass; vector components and free-body diagrams. |
| 03 Circular Motion & Gravitation | Uniform circular a = v²/r; Newtonian point/spherical-mass gravity; Kepler ratios for the same central mass with negligible orbiting mass. |
| 04 Energy & Work | Constant-force work W = Fd cos(angle); area under a force-component versus displacement graph; kinetic energy and conservation bookkeeping. |
| 05 Momentum & Collisions | Vector momentum and net external impulse; impulse from force-time area or average net force times the interval. State when momentum conservation applies. |
| 06 Simple Harmonic Motion | Linear spring, constant k and negligible damping: T = 2π√(m/k). Ideal small-angle pendulum: T = 2π√(L/g). |
| 07 Torque & Rotational Motion | Torque = force × perpendicular lever arm, or rF sin(angle); balanced moments, mechanical advantage, and rotational analogs of linear laws. |
| 08 Fluids & Pressure | Pressure P = perpendicular F/A; buoyancy from displaced fluid; steady mass continuity (constant density: A1v1 = A2v2). Bernoulli along a streamline assumes steady incompressible flow and negligible viscosity. |
Students read the slope off their own motion graph, resolve the force vector inside the inclined-plane lab, and work the pendulum’s period at the bench. The number always means something because it is attached to a result they produced — never a worksheet detached from the physics.
Integration is its own strand. Track each unit’s integration level across the year — Developing, Proficient, or Mastery — separate from the science-mastery rubric. Record the evidence reference and date in the final column.
| Unit | Developing | Proficient | Mastery | Evidence / date |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 01 Kinematics & Motion | ◯ | ◯ | ◯ | ______ |
| 02 Dynamics & Laws | ◯ | ◯ | ◯ | ______ |
| 03 Circular & Gravitation | ◯ | ◯ | ◯ | ______ |
| 04 Energy & Work | ◯ | ◯ | ◯ | ______ |
| 05 Momentum & Collisions | ◯ | ◯ | ◯ | ______ |
| 06 Simple Harmonic Motion | ◯ | ◯ | ◯ | ______ |
| 07 Torque & Rotation | ◯ | ◯ | ◯ | ______ |
| 08 Fluids & Pressure | ◯ | ◯ | ◯ | ______ |
A student who walks through all eight anchors finishes understanding that physics is how humans learned to measure and predict the moving world, and that every formula on the page was once a discovery someone fought for — the version of the subject a student keeps.