An approach to Hooke's law

Abstract

The usefulness of Hooke's law extends from elementary to very advanced levels of physics. However, in many cases this law is not clearly presented at the school level. Indeed, sometimes it is simply misrepresented (Farrell 1976). When relating Hooke's law for bulk matter to the nature of interatomic forces, textbooks normally use the potential energy curve as a function of the atomic separation distance. In school physics textbooks, however, this curve is very superficially treated, and as a result students may fail to benefit from the curve. The author discusses some of the points concerning the curve which often prove to be a stumbling block to students trying to understand the curve.