{{page>wiki:headers:hheader}}

Navigate [[..:..:..:activities:link|back to the activity]].

//by Corinne Manogue//

We have often used this activity in faculty-development workshops and TA training to make the point that students have to put many different ideas together to really understand why a given mathematical expression corresponds to a particular physical behavior.  It is quite surprising that many graduate students do not see the ``plane wave'' nature of this activity until the very last step, when they are asked to describe $\cos(\vec k\cdot\rr -\omega t)$.  Then, watch the light bulbs go on!!