Refraction - Law Enforcement - Directions

 

How it Works:

Using the Refraction - Law Enforcement Concept Builder is quite simple. There are four activities. As you progress through any of the activities, you will be presented with a question that you will have to answer. The question presents three situations involving the refraction of light at the boundary between two media. The first three activities focus on a single variable. The three variables are the relative speed of light of the two media, the relative optical density of the two media, and the relative index of refraction of the two media. The fourth activity includes all three variables mixed together.

In each situation, you will have to determine which of the three situtations violate the law of refraction regarding the direction that light bends. Tap on any situation that does. Once you tap on one or more situations, they will be displayed behind bars (since they break the law of refraction) and a Check Answer button appears. Once you are satisfied with your answer, tap on the Check Answer button. Your answer will be evaluated and your Progress Report will be updated. 

Your goal is to earn "Stars" and to complete one or more activities. Stars are earned when you demonstrate success with a particular Question Group. Once you show success on all the Question Groups of a particular activitiy, you will earn the reward for that activity.

Earning Stars

There are four activities in this Concept Builder. When you start up any of these activities, the number of questions for that activity are shown in the Progress Report area of the Concept Builder. You will notice that there is either a Yellow or a Red background for each question number. When starting up an activity, the background color is Yellow. Answering a "Yellow" question correctly earns you a star for that question number. However, answering it incorrectly turns the background color to Red. A question number with a Red background must be correctly answered twice (without a miss) in order to earn a star. 

 

Getting Help

You will notice that there is a Help Me button underneath the Progress Report. You should learn to use this feature of the program. It's how you can turn an exercise in answering questions into an exercise in learning. Tapping on the Help Me button will open a page with help that explains a detailed approach to each question. Of course, the Help pages are only helpful if you read them. So take the time to read them. Each Help page contains four sections: a discussion of the The Basic Idea, a display of the Question that you are trying to answer, a section titled "How to Think About This Situation", and a set of links to resources in our Tutorial section. You should pay attention to the section titled How to Think About This Situation. You will find what you need to know in the paragraphs of this section. You will also become a better Physics student for doing that. That is, after all, the goal of such a Concept Builder as Refraction - Law Enforcement.
 
 

Thanks for being patient with the Directions. Happy learning!