Physics: Principles And Problems Teacher Wraparound Edition (Hardcover)

by Paul W. Zitzewitz (Author)

Editorial Reviews

Product Description
This is the number one physics program in the nation - and for good reason. "Physics: Principles and Problems" presents concisely developed concepts supported by an appropriate amount of math and every day applications to make the subject interesting and unintimidating. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

Product Details

• Hardcover
• Publisher: Glencoe/Mcgraw-Hill (August 30, 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0078259347
• ISBN-13: 978-0078259340
• Shipping Information: View shipping rates and policies
• Average Customer Review: 2.1 out of 5 stars See all reviews (10 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #456,506 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

15 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Weak book, January 6, 2003

By A Customer

This review is from: Physics: Principles and Problems (Glencoe Science Professional) (Hardcover)

This book is very colorful and full of wonderful photos. Yet photos and color alone will not help you learn physics. The example problems they give are not explained step-by-step in a way that makes the application clearer. Worse yet the problems may be wrong some of the time. There are a few chapters that could be combined instead of splitting them up. Also, Newton's Laws are totally isolated from each other instead of being grouped together. The only way (at least that I know) to suceed in phyiscs is to work the problems. The book has a wonderful assortment of problems- yet no solutions or even answers are found in the back. Since most physics teachers won't give credit without work I don't see why putting the answers in the back could hurt. Overall the book is weak. I would read this book and do the homework assigned from the book, but my preparation for a test would come from a review book and a practice book with hundreds of solved problems (Schaum's or REA). That seems to work best for me. Oh and the last part in any physics course that determines how good you do is the teacher. For me I am not so lucky. But to you I wish the best of luck. You may have the same problems with this book that my whole class and apparantly other schools have had, or you will do well.

13 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Physics Principles and Problems, January 17, 2002

By A Customer

This review is from: Physics: Principles and Problems (Hardcover)

This is acually Jonathan Ray of Midlothian Virginia. I have spent many a late night pondering over the absutities I have read in my physics book. I am atempting to learn physics from this book but it seems that all I am learning is how to draw silly little pictures. The answers in the back of the book to the practice problems are wrong tothe point that I am woried when I get an answer that agrees with the the back of the book. On top of this there are numerous typeos on the text. On top of this there is no actual organization in the book as one has to read several chapters to understan Newton's laws which are presented out of order I might add. Overall a very confusing text that is not worth the paper it is printed on.

10 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Have I just encountered the worst book in all of history?, November 28, 2005

By	Elysia Aixarata (CA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Physics: Principles and Problems (Glencoe Science Professional) (Hardcover)

Quite possibly.
While I'm not nearly so far as some of these reviewers were when they reviewed the book, this physics book has pushed me so far beyond the reaches of my patience that I find no reason why I should not share with you how horribly this book fails to explain physics anyway.
In all my years of science classes, I have never come across a book this inept at conveying concepts. Generally my rule of thumb is, if you can look through a chapter, find the paragraph or so of information you need to answer a question or solve a problem, maybe an example problem to look at, then you've got a good book before you. This is not one such book.
Though the chapters are short, there is no conciseness or organization to the information within them. In order to learn a concept, you must trudge through three pages of very very very watered down information (who doesn't understand RISE over RUN equals SLOPE?). Normally, if a person gets impatient with the watered down stuff, they can skip to a box that has the equations, or a diagram with a caption underneath it. But I've discovered that this is impossible to do here. The text basically is the caption of all the wonderfully abundant diagrams and photographs provided AND the lesson material all in one.
And as for the diagrams, graphs, and other visuals, they seem to be poorly placed on the pages. Often times they are not labeled well enough to know what paragraph it is associated with, as if they were only afterwards slapped onto the page (which could explain why some of the explanations of these diagrams are downright cryptic).
There is no effectiveness to the method the author uses to explain concepts; there seems to be a meaningless abundance of explanation on how to draw diagrams, but when it comes down to the concepts, there's little to work with. If he was more succinct and organized, perhaps physics would make sense to many more students that have to work with this book.