Over the course of this lab, you will do ten experiments. Each experiment will be broken down as follows:

The pre-lab quiz will need to be done before the lab, and is mainly designed to ensure you are adequately prepared before you enter lab. You will perform this quiz on Brightspace, and receive immediate feedback.

All other components will be due at the beginning of your next lab period, excepting special circumstances. Together, they constitute the 'report' (here is a sample lab report to show a possible format).

You should submit these components digitally on Brightspace , where a place to upload will be provided. Note that you can submit multiple files in a single upload if needed.

Each lab will have an associated quiz to perform before you arrive to lab.

These quizzes will be multiple-choice (or true/false, or similar) and done through your Brightspace section. They are primarily intended to test you on the "big picture" of the lab, and not on the specific details that you can figure out when you get there.

All information required for these labs will be contained in the relevant manuals and data tables. You can refer to these resources (or any you choose) during the quiz, and they are not timed.

At the end of your quiz, you will get your score and be told the correct answers to all questions. You will then have the ability to take the quiz again, and your score will be the average of your two attempts. (The second attempt will have the same questions with the same answers, so you should get 100% the second time, boosting your score for free if you do so!)

This second attempt should encourage you to look over your incorrect answers before coming to lab, thereby correcting potential misconceptions.

Your abstract should summarize the key results for this experiment. This isn't intended to be a complete report for someone interested in the details, so you don't need to show your calculations or data - just give your final results and put them in context.

The goal of this part of the assignment is to show that you understand the "big picture" of the experiment - the core questions we were asking, and the answers to these questions your results gave (with whatever caveats are appropriate).

This should about a paragraph, maybe two for a long experiment. It should certaintly not be longer than half a page (single-spaced).

Each lab will have a corresponding data table on which to record your measured and calculated quantities (as well as any other observations).

These data sheets are Google Sheets templates that will be linked from the individual manuals. You should make a copy for yourself, edit that copy, then upload them to Brightspace as an Excel (.xls or .xlsx) file. [Be careful, Mac/Linux people!]

For more details on using Google Sheets in this class, see our Google Sheets Tutorial.

Calculations and Uncertainty Propagation: You can either write out your calculations in your main report (after doing them in the calculator), or show your work using formulas in Google Sheets. Generally, the latter is preferable, but by-hand calculations will be accepted if necessary.

Note that TA instructions supercede what is written here - they may demand (or prefer) that you hand-write your calculations at their discretion.

Plots: Make plots in the PHY121/122 Plotting Tool. They should always have a good, descriptive title; descriptive axis labels, with units; and error bars where appropriate. Remember that when people read a report, they will often skim, and look at the plots without greater context. For this reason, it should ideally be possible to understand what a plot is showing without reading the main text. For more details, see our Guide to Making and Using Plots.

Questions: Most manuals will have questions about the lab. Your TA will assign you some subset of these questions. Answer thoroughly. You can just number them; you don't need to put them in paragraph form.

Experiment-Dependent Sections: Some labs have extra sketches or other more esoteric pieces of data. If these are done by-hand, you should scan and submit them, either in your main document or separately. There is a scanner in the physics library on C floor, if you fail to find one elsewhere, so photographs taken from your phone will generally not be accepted.

Some questions require writing mathematical expressions. Here are a few possible ways to do that:

• You can use this tool to write almost any equation you want. It'll output an image that you can then copy and paste into another lab document.
• You can use the built-in tools for writing equations in whatever word processing application you use (although this is often a frustrating experience).
• You can leave space, print out your document, write in your equations by hand, and then re-scan and upload your document.
• You can put your calculations on a separate page and refer to them in some clear way (perhaps by numbering those equations).
• If you want to be particularly fancy, you could work more extensively in \(\LaTeX\), and write your whole document in it. See the discussion for the PHY133/134 lab here.

Any of these are acceptable, just be neat about it.