Revised NCERT Class 11 Physics Syllabus for 2021-22

NCERT Syllabus for Class 11 Physics – Free PDF Download

Physics is a crucial subject at the higher secondary stage of schooling. Students take up Physics, as a subject in Class 11 with the aim of pursuing their career ahead in this field. Physics students can go for further studies and research or pursue professional courses like medicine, engineering, technology after completing schooling. For achieving these aims it’s required that students have a conceptual and strong understanding of Physics subject. So, from Class 11, students must start focussing on building the background for Physics. The first step into this is knowing the NCERT Class 11 Physics Syllabus. To help students with their studies, we have provided the NCERT Syllabus for Class 11 Physics.

Students can get the detailed NCERT Syllabus for Class 11 Physics in PDF format by clicking on the link below. The syllabus PDF contains the units, topics under each unit and no. of periods required to finish a particular unit. Moreover, the PDF also includes NCERT Class 11 Physics Practical Syllabus containing the list of experiments and activities.

Download NCERT Class 11 for Class 11 Physics PDF

Students can have a look at the NCERT Syllabus for Class 11 Physics below. The detailed syllabus along with the practicals is also provided in the PDF.

NCERT Class 11 Physics Theory Syllabus (Total Periods: 180)

Unit I: Physical World and Measurement (Periods 10)

• Physics: Scope and excitement; nature of physical laws; Physics, technology and society.
• Need for measurement: Units of measurement; systems of units; SI units, fundamental and derived units. Length, mass and time measurements; accuracy and precision of measuring instruments; errors in measurement; significant figures.
• Dimensions of physical quantities, dimensional analysis and its applications.

Unit II: Kinematics (Periods 30)

• The frame of reference, Motion in a straight line: Position-time graph, speed and velocity. Uniform and non-uniform motion, average speed and instantaneous velocity. Uniformly accelerated motion, velocity-time and position-time graphs, relations for uniformly accelerated motion (graphical treatment).
• Elementary concepts of differentiation and integration for describing motion. Scalar and vector quantities: Position and displacement vectors, general vectors and notation, equality of vectors, multiplication of vectors by a real number; addition and subtraction of vectors. Relative velocity.
• Unit vectors. Resolution of a vector in a plane – rectangular components.
• Scalar and Vector products of Vectors. Motion in a plane. Cases of uniform velocity and uniform acceleration – projectile motion. Uniform circular motion.

Unit III: Laws of Motion (Periods 16)

• Intuitive concept of force. Inertia, Newton’s first law of motion; momentum and Newton’s second law of motion; impulse; Newton’s third law of motion. Law of conservation of linear momentum and its applications.
• Equilibrium of concurrent forces. Static and kinetic friction, laws of friction, rolling friction, lubrication.
• Dynamics of uniform circular motion: Centripetal force, examples of circular motion (vehicle on level circular road, vehicle on banked road).

Unit IV: Work, Energy and Power (Periods 16)

• Work done by a constant force and a variable force; kinetic energy, work-energy theorem, power.
• The notion of potential energy, the potential energy of a spring, conservative forces; conservation of mechanical energy (kinetic and potential energies); non-conservative forces; motion in a vertical circle, elastic and inelastic collisions in one and two dimensions.

Unit V: Motion of System of Particles and Rigid Body (Periods 18)

• Centre of a mass of a two-particle system, momentum conservation and centre of mass motion. Centre of a mass of a rigid body; the centre of mass of the uniform rod.
• Moment of a force, torque, angular momentum, conservation of angular momentum with some examples.
• Equilibrium of rigid bodies, rigid body rotation and equation of rotational motion, comparison of linear and rotational motions; a moment of inertia, the radius of gyration. Values of M.I. for simple geometrical objects (no derivation). Statement of parallel and perpendicular axes theorems and their applications.

Unit VI: Gravitation (Periods 14)

• Kepler’s laws of planetary motion. The universal law of gravitation. Acceleration due to gravity and its variation with altitude and depth.
• Gravitational potential energy; gravitational potential. Escape velocity, orbital velocity of a satellite. Geostationary satellites.

Unit VII: Properties of Bulk Matter (Periods 28)

• Elastic behaviour, Stress-strain relationship, Hooke’s law, Young’s modulus, bulk modulus, shear, modulus of rigidity, poisson’s ratio; elastic energy.
• Pressure due to a fluid column; Pascal’s law and its applications (hydraulic lift and hydraulic brakes). Effect of gravity on fluid pressure.
• Viscosity, Stokes’ law, terminal velocity, Reynold’s number, streamline and turbulent flow. Critical velocity, Bernoulli’s theorem and its applications.
• Surface energy and surface tension, angle of contact, excess of pressure, application of surface tension ideas to drops, bubbles and capillary rise.
• Heat, temperature, thermal expansion; thermal expansion of solids, liquids, and gases. Anomalous expansion. Specific heat capacity: Cp, Cv – calorimetry; change of state – latent heat.
• Heat transfer – conduction and thermal conductivity, convection and radiation. Qualitative ideas of Black Body Radiation, Wein’s displacement law, and Green House effect.
• Newton’s law of cooling and Stefan’s law.

Unit VIII: Thermodynamics (Periods 12)

• Thermal equilibrium and definition of temperature (zeroth law of Thermodynamics). Heat, work and internal energy. The first law of thermodynamics. Isothermal and adiabatic processes.
• The second law of thermodynamics: Reversible and irreversible processes. Heat engines and refrigerators.

Unit IX: Behaviour of Perfect Gas and Kinetic Theory (Periods 8)

• Equation of state of a perfect gas, work done on compressing a gas.
• Kinetic theory of gases: Assumptions, the concept of pressure. Kinetic energy and temperature; rms speed of gas molecules; degrees of freedom, the law of equipartition of energy (statement only) and application to specific heat capacities of gases; the concept of mean free path, Avogadro’s number.

Unit X: Oscillations and Waves (Periods 28)

• Periodic motion – period, frequency, displacement as a function of time. Periodic functions. Simple harmonic motion (SHM) and its equation; phase; oscillations of a spring – restoring force and force constant; energy in SHM – kinetic and potential energies; simple pendulum – derivation of expression for its time period; free, forced and damped oscillations (qualitative ideas only), resonance.
• Wave motion. Longitudinal and transverse waves, speed of wave motion. Displacement relation for a progressive wave. Principle of superposition of waves, reflection of waves, standing waves in strings and organ pipes, fundamental mode and harmonics. Beats. Doppler effect.

NCERT Syllabus for Class 11 Physics Practicals (Total Periods: 60)

The NCERT Syllabus for practicals is divided into two sections i.e section A and Section B. Each section contains a list of experiments and activities.

Section A

Experiments

1. To measure the diameter of a small spherical/cylindrical body using Vernier callipers.
2. To measure internal diameter and depth of a given beaker/calorimeter using Vernier callipers and hence find its volume.
3. To measure the diameter of a given wire using screw gauge.
4. To measure the thickness of a given sheet using screw gauge.
5. To measure the volume of an irregular lamina using screw gauge.
6. To determine the radius of curvature of a given spherical surface by a spherometer.
7. To determine the mass of two different objects using a beam balance.
8. To find the weight of a given body using the parallelogram law of vectors.
9. Using a simple pendulum, plot L-T and L-T² graphs. Hence find the effective length of a second’s pendulum using an appropriate graph.
10. To study the relationship between the force of limiting friction and normal reaction and to find the coefficient of friction between a block and a horizontal surface.
11. To find the downward force, along an inclined plane, acting on a roller due to gravitational pull of the earth and study its relationship with the angle of inclination (θ) by plotting graph between force and sin θ.

Activities

1. To make a paper scale of given least count, e.g. 0.2 cm, 0.5 cm.
2. To determine the mass of a given body using a metre scale by the principle of moments.
3. To plot a graph for a given set of data, with a proper choice of scales and error bars.
4. To measure the force of limiting friction for rolling of a roller on a horizontal plane.
5. To study the variation in the range of a jet of water with the angle of projection.
6. To study the conservation of energy of a ball rolling down on inclined plane (using a double inclined plane).
7. To study the dissipation of energy of a simple pendulum by plotting a graph between square of amplitude and time.

Section B

Experiments

1. To determine Young’s modulus of elasticity of the material of a given wire.
2. To find the force constant of a helical spring by plotting a graph between load and extension.
3. To study the variation in volume with pressure for a sample of air at constant temperature by plotting graphs between P and V, and between P and 1/V.
4. To determine the surface tension of water by capillary rise method.
5. To determine the coefficient of viscosity of a given viscous liquid by measuring the terminal velocity of a given spherical body.
6. To study the relationship between the temperature of a hot body and time by plotting a cooling curve.
7. To determine the specific heat capacity of a given (i) solid (ii) liquid, by the method of mixtures.
8. (i) To study the relation between frequency and length of a given wire under constant tension using sonometer.
   (ii) To study the relation between the length of a given wire and tension for constant frequency using sonometer.
9. To find the speed of sound in air at room temperature using a resonance tube by two resonance positions.

Activities

1. To observe the change of state and plot a cooling curve for molten wax.
2. To observe and explain the effect of heating on a bi-metallic strip.
3. To note the change in the level of liquid in a container on heating and interpret the observations.
4. To study the effect of detergent on the surface tension of water by observing capillary rise.
5. To study the factors affecting the rate of loss of heat of a liquid.
6. To study the effect of load on the depression of a suitably clamped meter scale loaded at
   (i) at its end
   (ii) in the middle.

Features of NCERT Class 11 Physics Syllabus

Below we have listed a few features of the Class 11 NCERT Syllabus.

1. The syllabus focuses on building a conceptual understanding of topics in students.
2. The syllabus provides logical placement of the “Units” and concepts so that students can easily correlate the topics.
3. The use of SI Units, Symbols, the nomenclature of physical quantities and formulations in the Physics syllabus is as per international standards.
4. The syllabus promotes the applications of Physics concepts in real-life situations so that Physics learning can be made more meaningful and interesting for students.

After knowing the syllabus it’s recommended for students to study from the NCERT Class 11 Physics Book. This book follows the NCERT syllabus and is the best source of study for students.

Students can also access the NCERT Solutions of BYJU’S that are available for all subjects of Classes 1 to 12. These NCERT Solutions can be viewed both online and downloaded as PDF for online viewing. Moreover, creating subject/chapter notes will become a lot easier with the help of these solutions.

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