State Formalism
Highlights of the activity
- Have students practice translating between z, x, and y states
- Have students practice simple state calculations: showing specific states are orthonormal
Reasons to spend class time on the activity
The main purpose of this activity is to provide students with practice using the state formalism mathematically. They need to be able to change basis, do inner products, and show normality. This is one of their first chances to practice these ideas, so the activity is split up such that multiple groups are working on the same thing and can help each other, then the groups can present their results to the rest of the class, explaining the steps.