Recommended Books

You will be provided by an AQA endorsed Nelson Thornes textbook for AS physics, which contains the course content, and which we shall occasionally use in lessons and for homeworks. Whilst this text is neither perfect nor infallible, it does have lots of exam-style questions, and tends to use the exam board vocabulary of terminology in the way that the AQA examiners do!

I shall also be giving references both to relevant sections of this book, and to worked examples, which help explain or expand on the material presented in lessons. Similarly, the question sheets may sometimes refer to the examples in these books for those who wish to try additional problems. This is to encourage you to develop your skills in utilising the more extensive resource material provided in text-books to deepen your understanding of physics.

To this end, it is definitely worth consulting other sources of information apart from the Nelson Thornes textbook. The internet is very good for physics information (if you find a good website, email me so I can put it on the E:HEBER site) and also there are other A-level textbooks available; some which I think are very clear and thorough are listed below. Different textbooks suit different people, and indeed one might find an explanation of one thing better in one textbook, whilst another textbook is clearer for another area of physics.

Some "quick reference books" are useful for revision purposes and help with formulae and mathematical work in the course are below.

There is certainly no need to go and spend large sums of money on additional textbooks or other reading material about physics, though. Indeed, before buying a book for yourself, I recommend that you borrow it from a library so you can see whether or not you like the style. Feel free to recommend them to the school library, or you can see the librarian to find out whether an inter-library loan can be arranged.

For each topic, I shall also try to recommend some books which I know to be good from outside the syllabus content, for those who are interested to explore a little further, which can only enrich and deepen your understanding. Some general ideas for further reading are below (if you are wanting to read a particular book very badly, I have copies of some of the titles):

Happy reading!