Exceling in Physical Science

Physical Science courses have been recently non mathematical due to declining standards in K-12 education. Comparing any current physical science textbook with Kemble’s Physical Science: It’s Structure and Development shows this demise of mathematics education. We have tried to reintroduce more rigor by showing our students to use Excel to solve Newton’s second law iteratively. No algebra is utilized, just arithmetic. The preliminary results are promising. Students are able to solve numerous physically interesting problems with their Excel programs without the use of algebra. By using purely Newtonian physics, electromagnetism and atomic physics are easily introduced into the curriculum. Some of the spreadsheets that have been developed by physical science students will be presented. We will also indicate how this approach will be incorporated into our Physical Science II course which covers astronomy, chemistry, and geology.