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Formative assessment questions for teaching physics

A2L Item 123

  • Description: Identify the correct electric fields due to charges.
  • Goal: Reasoning with electric fields.
  • Source: UMPERG-A2LEM7
  • Keywords: Electromagnetism, Electric Field

The question for students:

The diagrams show two uniformly charged spheres. The charge on the right sphere is three times as large as the charge on the left sphere. Each vector represents the electric field at the center of one sphere caused by the other sphere. Which choice best represents the magnitude and direction of the electric field vectors caused by one sphere at the position of the other sphere?

Item123_fig1.gif

Commentary for teachers:

Answer

(5) The electric field at the sphere with smaller charge is three times larger than the field at the sphere with larger charge.