The Physics Question Bank

📝 Notes and questions – Waves

• Wave properties: transverse and longitudinal waves (C+S)
• Reflection, absorption and transmission (S only)
• Refraction and wavefront diagrams (C+S; wavefronts HT)
• Electromagnetic waves (C+S)
• Colour and filters (S only)
• Lenses and visible light (S only)
• Drawing ray diagrams: mirrors and lenses – with draw-along videos (S only)
• Sound waves and hearing (S only, HT)
• Sound, ultrasound and seismic waves (S only)
• Black body radiation and infrared (S only)

✏️ Key diagrams to draw – Waves

18 diagrams with step-by-step pencil-and-label instructions, including transverse and longitudinal waves, ray diagrams, lenses, the EM spectrum and the required practicals. Draw the Waves diagrams

📚 Everything for Waves

• More practice: Waves and magnetism mixed equation practice
• Revise: Fill the gaps: Waves · Waves mind map guide
• Lessons: Help or Hazard? · Sound Investigators · Earthquake Detectives (S only)
• Practicals: Required practicals (waves; infrared radiation; light and refraction – S only)

⚠️ Where students lose marks – Waves

Common mistakes highlighted in AQA examiners’ reports (2019, 2022 and 2023), in our own words.

• Explaining refraction (HT) – use wavefronts. When a wavefront hits a boundary at an angle, one part enters the new material first and changes speed first, while the rest is still moving at the old speed – so the wave changes direction. Just saying “light slows down in glass” gets 1 mark at most.
• “Human error” on its own scores nothing. Say exactly what could go wrong and why – e.g. “it’s hard to mark the centre of a wide ray, so the angle measured could be wrong”.
• Refraction practical: include removing the block to draw the ray through it, drawing the normal, measuring both angles from the normal with a protractor, and a sensible range and interval of angles.
• Waves on a string practical: say HOW you change things – e.g. move the bridge to change the length, add masses to change the tension, adjust the signal generator to change the frequency. Convert cm to m before using v = fλ.
• In the same material, changing the frequency does NOT change the wave speed – the wavelength changes instead.
• Echo calculations: the pulse travels there AND back, so halve the distance. Give the answer to the significant figures asked for.
• X-rays: they pass through SOFT tissue but are ABSORBED by bone – bones don’t reflect X-rays.
• Microphones: sound waves make the diaphragm (and coil) vibrate, which induces a VARYING current that matches the sound. It doesn’t “amplify” sound.
• Lenses: use the word “virtual” (not “not real”), and finish ray diagrams with an arrow showing where the image is and which way up.
• Know the words specular and diffuse. Reflection from a smooth surface in one direction is specular; from a rough surface it’s scattered (diffuse).
• Infrared: answer the question asked. If it asks about ABSORBING, don’t write about emitting or reflecting. Matt black is the best absorber; when comparing matt and shiny, compare surfaces of the SAME colour.
• Precise ≠ accurate. Precise results are close together; accurate results are close to the true value.
• Graphs: label both axes with units, and draw a smooth curve of best fit if the points lie on a curve. Convert wavelengths (e.g. nm → m) before using v = fλ.