LABKickstart Benchtop

OpenStax is a nonprofit education initiative at Rice University. The labs posted here are adapted from the OpenStax College Physics for AP Courses Lab Manual and shared under CC BY 4.0. Access for free at openstax.org. This account is a credit line, not a person: OpenStax did not write these adaptations and does not run them.

• № 01
  Conservation of momentum in cart collisionsStarter example

  Collide two carts on a level track twice, once so they bounce apart and once so they stick together, and test whether momentum and kinetic energy survive each kind of collision.
  Topic Mechanics

  Grade AP / IB

  Level4/5
  1 to 2 periods

  0 comments

  1 file

  Jul 2026
• № 02
  Ohm's law and the resistivity of a wireStarter example

  Build a simple battery circuit to show current is proportional to voltage, then measure how a wire's resistance depends on its length, its thickness and what it is made of.
  Topic Electricity & Magnetism

  Grade AP / IB

  Level3/5
  1 period

  0 comments

  1 file

  Jul 2026
• № 03
  Boyle's law: pressure and volume of a gasStarter example

  Trap a fixed amount of air, squeeze it with known weights, and measure how its volume falls as the pressure rises. The area under the resulting curve is the work done on the gas.
  Topic Thermodynamics

  Grade AP / IB

  Level3/5
  1 period

  0 comments

  1 file

  Jul 2026
• № 04
  Speed of sound with a resonance tubeStarter example

  Hold a struck tuning fork over a column of air and change the column length until the note jumps in volume. That resonance length gives you a wavelength, and the wavelength gives you the speed of sound.
  Topic Waves & Sound

  Grade AP / IB

  Level3/5
  1 period

  0 comments

  1 file

  Jul 2026
• № 05
  Snell's law and the focal length of a lensStarter example

  Two classic optics measurements in one session: bend a laser through a glass block to find its index of refraction, then use a converging lens to form a real image and pull the focal length out of the data.
  Topic Optics

  Grade AP / IB

  Level3/5
  1 to 2 periods

  0 comments

  1 file

  Jul 2026