Finding a Physics Book with Comprehensive Explanation for High Schoolers

AI Thread Summary
The discussion centers around the need for supplemental physics textbooks for high school students struggling with their current curriculum, which lacks detailed explanations. Participants express dissatisfaction with their school's physics book, which primarily presents example problems without sufficient context or understanding. Recommendations include "Basic Physics: A Self-Teaching Guide" by Karl F. Kuhn for its algebra-based approach and "Physics for Scientists and Engineers" (6th edition) for its comprehensive coverage. Other suggested titles include specific Amazon links for additional resources aimed at filling knowledge gaps. Concerns are raised about certain self-teaching guides that focus on memorization rather than conceptual understanding. The conversation reflects a collective search for accessible, explanatory materials to enhance their grasp of physics concepts such as vectors, momentum, and kinematics.
Phantomfrk
Messages
1
Reaction score
0
I am still in high school taking a Physics class and honestly the book the school gave us just shows you example problems. So I was wondering if you guys knew of any good Beginning Physics books that would be good and have a lot more explanation.

All we have done so far is learned about vectors, momentum, impulse, and a few formulas about distance, velocity, and acceleration.

Our teacher doesn't really teach us so i am looking for a book with A LOT of EXPLANATION so that even I can understand this stuff

Thank you
 
Physics news on Phys.org
I am in the same situation. I plan to order https://www.amazon.com/dp/0070257345/?tag=pfamazon01-20
for problem solving and see what i can do. I just use my school's physics book for the basic explanation; however, I am planning to buy another book about basic physics to fill in the gaps that my other physics book left behind.

Any recommendations?

Looks like we are the only high school students on this site.. lol
 
Last edited:
Basic Physics: A Self-Teaching Guide by Karl F. Kuhn is pretty good for algebra based physics, which is probably what you're taking in high school.
 
Look for
"Physics for Scientists and engineerings" 6th edition.. there are two volumes to this
those books are really good.. the cover is blue
 
I'm trying to figure out what will supplement my knowledge. So far, I'm looking at these books(in order of preference) :
1.https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0471762504/?tag=pfamazon01-20
2.https://www.amazon.com/dp/0935218084/?tag=pfamazon01-20
3.https://www.amazon.com/dp/0471134473/?tag=pfamazon01-20

I might order the first and second book, but I'm not sure. The self-teaching guide(3) just asserts the formula and makes you memorize it without figuring out how they derived it. I can't see why people like the self-teaching guide so much.. i read the first few pages..

I'm looking for a detailed and a comprehensive intro to physics to supplement my Holt Physics textbook by Serway and Faughin

How about those Schaums?

Is it a good choice to buy 1 and 2?
 
Last edited by a moderator:
The book is fascinating. If your education includes a typical math degree curriculum, with Lebesgue integration, functional analysis, etc, it teaches QFT with only a passing acquaintance of ordinary QM you would get at HS. However, I would read Lenny Susskind's book on QM first. Purchased a copy straight away, but it will not arrive until the end of December; however, Scribd has a PDF I am now studying. The first part introduces distribution theory (and other related concepts), which...
I've gone through the Standard turbulence textbooks such as Pope's Turbulent Flows and Wilcox' Turbulent modelling for CFD which mostly Covers RANS and the closure models. I want to jump more into DNS but most of the work i've been able to come across is too "practical" and not much explanation of the theory behind it. I wonder if there is a book that takes a theoretical approach to Turbulence starting from the full Navier Stokes Equations and developing from there, instead of jumping from...

Similar threads

Replies
17
Views
2K
Replies
8
Views
171
Replies
10
Views
4K
Replies
9
Views
4K
Replies
14
Views
1K
Back
Top