Physics Higher Level Leaving Certificate paper review, By Emma O Brien
Overall, this year’s paper was a fair paper with less mixing of topics than previous years. A well-prepared student would have welcomed this exam. This was a nice paper which allowed the students to show off their knowledge of Physics and not seeking to catch anyone out.
In Section A, students had to answer 3 out of 5 experiment questions. With the experiment questions each being from a different topic: Mechanics, Light, Waves, Heat and Electricity, students had a huge amount of choice. Whereas in previous years, there would have been two experiment questions from Mechanics or two from Electricity, for example. The Experiment questions generally followed the same layout as in previous years and were very manageable.
In Section B, students had to answer 5 out of 9 questions. Question 6 would be the most popular question with students, consisting of a series of short questions. There was good variety in question 6 with a good mix of calculation and theory questions. The rest of the questions in Section B consisted of the topics of Force Mass and Momentum, Sound, Radioactivity, Heat, Static Electricity, Electromagnetic Induction, Particle Physics, Energy, Circular Motion, Simple Harmonic Motion, Electric Circuits, and the Photoelectric effect. There was minimal mixing of topics in these questions, and they were very approachable questions following a standard layout students would be familiar with from practicing previous Exam Papers.
