Series and Parallel AC Circuits

Phasor diagrams are powerful analytical tools, if one knows how to draw and interpret them. With hand calculators being so powerful and readily able to handle complex numbers in either polar or rectangular form, there is temptation to avoid phasor diagrams and let the calculator handle all the angle manipulation. However, students will have a much better understanding of phasors and complex numbers in AC circuits if you hold them accountable to representing quantities in that form.

This would be an excellent question to have students present methods of solution for. Sometimes I have students present nothing but their solution steps on the board in front of class (no arithmetic at all), in order to generate a discussion on problem-solving strategies. The important part of their education here is not to arrive at the correct answer or to memorize an algorithm for solving this type of problem, but rather how to think like a problem-solver, and how to methodically apply the math they know to the problem(s) at hand.

Inductors are the least “pure” of any reactive component, due to significant quantities of resistance in the windings. Discuss this fact with your students, and what it means with reference to choosing inductors versus capacitors in circuit designs that could use either.