Electricity & magnetism I: course materials

Physics 3310, principles of electricity and magnetism 1, is the first semester of our two-semester sequence of junior-level classical electromagnetism. It uses the tools of vector calculus for solving static and dynamic properties of electromagnetic fields. The topics we will cover include special cases of static charge distributions (electrostatics), time-independent current distributions (magnetostatics), and electric and magnetic properties of matter (dielectrics and magnetic media).

To access the materials 
please visit our

¶¶Òõ¶ÌÊÓƵ the transformation:

We transformed junior-level E&M using:

  • Explicit learning goals
  • Interactive lectures
  • Transformed homework problems (including a "bank" of potential HW problems)
  • Common student difficulties & in-class group activities
  • Concept tests ("clicker" questions)
  • Interactive tutorial worksheets

Course effectiveness was investigated through the following assessments:

  • Traditional exams
  • A new research-based conceptual assessment (the Colorado Upper-Division Electrostatics Assessment, or ¶¶Òõ¶ÌÊÓƵE).

Download course materials

  • Click here to download a zip file containing all course materials except assessments
  • Please email us at Steven.Pollock@colorado.edu to obtain a zip file of all course materials including assessments.

Contact: Steven Pollock atÌý³§³Ù±ð±¹±ð²Ô.±Ê´Ç±ô±ô´Ç³¦°ì°ª³¦´Ç±ô´Ç°ù²¹»å´Ç.±ð»å³Ü if you would like to be notified when our materials are updated.

Instructors and education researchers are free to use and adapt these materials for non-commercial purposes, according to the Creative Commons license below. We ask for your cooperation in not making any solutions you may create for the homework (and exam problems, clicker questions, etc...) available on the open web, out of respect for instructors and students at other institutions, and for maintaining the integrity of our research.

Are you using these materials?

Publications and posters

  • See all publications related to this effort.

Other resources

  • Our materials on the 
  • Instructor manual of "best practices in clicker use"
  • PER at University of Colorado with other posters, talks and research papers on similar topics
  • with similar upper-division activities

This material is based upon work supported by the national science foundation under Grant No. 0737118.

Any opinions, findings and conclusions or recomendations expressed in this material are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the national science foundation (NSF).