Welcome to Classical Physics 1! The main focus of this course is the theory of classical mechanics that was first brought to mature form by Isaac Newton. I take a somewhat non-standard approach with a heavy emphasis on the concepts of momentum and energy, but at the end of the day, it’s all the normal stuff (forces, motion, baby Yoda…)

This site is the primary place to come for course resources. You’ll find links to the syllabus, the schedule, and the online homework system via the sidebar.

The course lecture schedule will gradually be populated with links for our Zoom sessions.

Note that for the online setting, I will divide the class into smaller groups of about 20 students each. These groups will normally meet once a week on a particular day (Monday, Wednesday, or Friday). The main lecture content is embedded with the online problem sets and our live meetings will be in the form of tutorials. These are a sort-of hybrid between lectures, recitations, and quiz sessions, sometimes they will be more of one, sometimes more of the other. The key to getting the most out of this course is to come prepared to the tutorial meetings. Typically this means that you have watched the lecture videos for that week and have attempted at least some of the problem set problems. Sometimes, there will be something different or extra that I assign to you. The smaller group size means that we will be able to be far more interactive, particularly in the online situation.

Please be on the look out for more information and don’t hesitate to email me if you have questions. My email is dkagan and the domain is umassd.edu.