Preparation before Physics degree

Hi there - would like to ask about how you spent the summer before entry to the Physics undergraduate degree.

Also, what is the best way I could prepare for the course?

Thank you

Hi I've just finished my first year of Physics so hopefully I can be helpful - feel free to ask if you have any other questions!

1. RELAX. Have some fun - this is the last time in a long while that you'll get any really properly free holiday time (until next summer, in fact). See your friends, recover from whatever exams you might have been sitting, go places, do whatever you want. Don't overwork yourself before you even get there or you'll burn out. You might want to get a job/continue working if you already have one and earn some money.

2. You'll be contacted by your college/tutors etc. shortly after A level results day (what exactly you get depends on your college). This will include your vacation work to be handed in during Freshers' week most likely. Don't worry about this until then, you'll have a month and a half to do it still which is plenty of time! Mostly for physics everyone gets the same thing - tutors might change things a bit and there are a couple of versions, but essentially it's half maths, half physics, based on things you should already have covered - mostly a level recap/getting you back into things so you haven't totally forgotten how to do maths by the time you start doing actual work. You'll also be sent a link to the online bridging course for science subjects, so you can look over the relevant areas and see if anything needs brushing up a bit.

3. In the first term, the courses are (as far as I can remember, and assuming they haven't switched anything around): calculus, vectors & matrices, complex numbers and ordinary differential equations (ODEs), geometric optics, the first third of mechanics, special relativity and circuit theory.

Calculus, mechanics + complex nos and ODEs are all relatively straightforward courses with strong basis in A level material currently (especially if you've done the relevant further maths units for complex nos and ODEs). Vectors and Matrices is one of the harder things you come across in first year because the lecturer goes very fast and into an amount of detail that you don't actually need for the exam (although it does appear in problem sheets, since he also writes them), and you should take it seriously from the beginning - and it's worth being familiar with further maths vectors and matrices here (lines and planes in 3D, inverses of 3x3 matrices etc), but again - don't worry about work for at least the first half of your holiday!

(Personally, I did pretty much nothing for physics except the set work over the holidays and some of the online bridging stuff.)

I can't thank you enough! How have you found your first year?

Would it be a good idea/useful to do a bit of programming during the holidays to practice?

Hi there - would like to ask about how you spent the summer before entry to the Physics undergraduate degree.

Also, what is the best way I could prepare for the course?

Thank you