In this article, I will introduce you to one of the best way to understand the basic concepts of Physics using real world Physics simulations. Physics plays a very important role throughout the Universe. From an atom to a plane to vast space, Physics is everywhere. Everything around us works on laws of Physics.
How do the planes fly? Why do satellites not fall down? Why do we fall forward when a moving bus stopped suddenly? All these questions can be easily answered by laws of Physics. Here is a cool website that will help you understand the laws of Physics using real world simulations. It helps you discover the laws of physics that govern the world around you in a fun and interactive way.
CK-12 Foundation is building simulators for better understanding and interactive learning. They made Physics simulators to learn the basic concepts of Physics. You can access these simulations on their website as well as an app, available for Android and iOS. Their Physics Simulator has over 80 real world settings simulations.
How Does These Real Life Physics Simulations Work?
These simulations are very easy to work with. Go to CK-12 Physics Simulations, all the Physics simulations they have made so far are listed there. You can search for Simulations under the search box, to find what you seek. If you are interested in some particular Concepts, you can easily filter them out using Filters options.
When you open a simulation, a question is shown on the screen followed by a short video tutorial. Let’s take this “Airplane Stall” question for example. It shows a question full of curiosity. Below that, there is a play icon, which leads to a video, that will help you to understand the concept.
Once the video is finished, a simulation screen is shown. The simulation has basic terms and toggles which you can change to simulate the model. Like for Airplane Stall question, in the simulation, you can change the Wing Profile, Thrust, Angle of Attack, and Airplane size. You can toggle these options and effects will be simulated accordingly. This is like working with a Physics Sandbox Game, but is much easier than that.
At the end of the simulation, there are interactive practice problems that you can try in the simulation. You can write your questions if you have any. Your questions will appear in Community Contributed tab, where anyone can see and answer them.
Some of the Topics Covered by these simulations are:
- Motion and Force
- Momentum, Work, Power, and Energy
- Waves
- Electricity and Magnetism
- The Atom
- Introduction to Physics
- Newton’s Laws of Motion
Closing Words:
CK-12 Physics Simulations provide a platform that helps people understanding the complex concepts of Physics easily. These simulations are quite simple and offer good information. A mobile app is available on Android and iOS, you can use it anywhere as long as you have a tablet device with you as the app does not support mobile devices yet, though there are other Physics apps for Android that you can use. The simulation will work offline once downloaded. Overall these simulations are helpful and fun way to understand Physics. These can excite people to learn the basic concepts of Physics, especially children.
Grab the app on
Play Store (Android)
App Store (iOS).
