Section 2 Essential course information
This section covers essential course information, including the meeting times, textbook, and grading scheme.
Subsection 2.1 Course website
- Links to important resources, like this syllabus, and the textbook.
- Links to key course activities, including the online homework, and the discussion forum. (The links will log you into those services automatically.)
- Details about your grades and assessments.
- A weekly topics schedule.
In case there's a day when Moodle isn't working properly and you need access to course materials, you can find some of them (like this syllabus) on my personal website 2 . The textbook for this course (and many others) is available on our Open Textbook Server 3 .
Subsection 2.2 Scheduled classes
Class meetings are Tuesday and Thursday in UHall C756 from 12:00 — 1:15 pm. Tutorials run on Wednesday in UHall B543, at either 10:30 am or 4:30 pm, depending on your section.
Depending on suitability of classroom technology, I will try to provide hybrid instruction for our classes. This means I will have Zoom open during class, and will mostly use a tablet and projector, rather than the board. Where applicable (i.e. when I'm speaking) I will record class.
If circumstances prevent you from attending class during the scheduled time, you will have access to the recordings and the textbook. We use Campuswire as a course communication platform. One of its nice features is the ability to set up chat rooms for students who want to work together, but can't make it to class.
Classes will consist mostly of active learning. The textbook already contains pre-recorded video for most content. Our “lectures” will be used for quizzes, assignments, and Q&A. Every Tuesday, we will take some time for homework Q&A, and then you'll be given an assignment to work on. Thursday classes will be used for a quiz. (See Subsection 2.4 below for details.)
Subsection 2.3 Course textbook
Our course textbook is APEX Calculus 4 , by Greg Hartman. This book is an open education resource (OER). That means that the book is fully free, both in terms of cost, your freedom to use and share the book however you see fit.
If getting the book for free somehow feels wrong, or you worry you're missing out by not buying anything, here are two great books you can buy:
- Mathematics for Human Flourishing 5 , by Francis Su
- Change is the Only Constant 6 , by Ben Orlin
Neither of these books are in any way needed for the course. But they're cool books, and they're about math. (The second is even about Calculus!) So if you feel like you need to spend money on a book, you can. (Or I don't know, go to the library or something.)
Subsection 2.4 Grading scheme
The various graded components of the course are explained below. At first it will seem like there's a lot to do! But most items are small, and many can be done during class time.
- Tutorials (15%)
- Tutorials will more like a lab in their structure. Each tutorial will have an assignment, and many of these will involve the computer. In particular, we will learn how to use some basic Python code to assist us in solving calculus problems. Any computer work will be done via the University's Syzygy 7 Jupyter hub, which you can access via any web browser.
- Online Homework (15%)
- Every week, you will be assigned a set of online homework problems, to help develop proficiency with the computational procedures in the course. Homework will be delivered through the WeBWorK online homework system. See Subsection 3.1 for details.
- Assignments (20%)
-
There will also be written assignments each Tuesday. You will have time to work on them during class, and assignments will be done in groups. A typical assignment will consist of one or two problems that are slightly less routine than the online homework. 8 Once an assignment is marked, you will be allowed to submit revisions to any problems where mistakes were made.Here is a fictitious (but possibly informative) grading rubric for assignments:
- A: wow, they clearly discussed this as a group, and nailed down all the key points! I also appreciate how the work is legible and relatively free of frustrated scribbling.
- B: everyone had something to say, but I'm not sure they all agreed. There's an obvious mistake that someone should have caught, suggesting that nobody thought to read it over before submitting.
- C: most of the details are there but this was clearly done in the last hour before the deadline. Also, it looks suspiciously like one person did all the work.
- D: looks like parts (a), (b), (c), and (d) were each done by a different person, and then arranged randomly on the page.
- F: nothing submitted. Or work is a crude drawing of what appears to be an integral attacking a kitten.
- Quizzes (30%)
-
Quizzes will take place every Thursday, during class time. The quiz format will be as follows:
-
Individual Quiz.Each quiz will be short: two or three questions covering material from that week. (Expect problems similar to the online homework.) You will have 30 minutes to write the quiz.
-
Group Quiz.After a 5 minute break (to collect quiz papers and organize groups) there will be a 20 minute group quiz. The group quiz will typically include the same questions as the individual quiz.
-
Discussion.Once the group quiz is complete, we'll have about 20 minutes left to discuss the quiz, or any other problems from the week (for example, the online homework).
Your score on each quiz will be the 80% individual and 20% group, unless your individual score is better than your group score, in which case you score will be 100% individual.Quiz accommodations: students who write with the Accommodated Learning Centre are encouraged to schedule their quiz before class, so that the do not miss out on the group stage of the quiz. If this is not possible, we can discuss alternate arrangements.Remote access: if you are unable to attend class in person (for whatever reason) I will arrange for you to access the quiz remotely. As long as at least two students are writing remotely, we will try to make arrangements for the group quiz as well. -
Individual Quiz.
- Final Exam (20%)
- We will have a scheduled, cumulative, in-person final exam. Details will be provided on Moodle toward the end of the semester. Final exams are scheduled by the Registrar about one month into the term.
Regrading policy:
- All graded work can be revised and resubmitted for extra credit. Corrections should be submitted within one week of work being returned, and you can earn back up to 50% of the points you lost by making corrections. (For tutorials, you can earn back 100% of the points you lost.)
- A resubmission form will be provided via Moodle for submitting your revisions. If you'd like to discuss your feedback first, we can discuss corrections during student hours. For group work, emails (or student hour appointments) should include the whole group.
- Corrections are based on feedback: to revise a question, you must first attempt the question. (Don't leave anything blank.)
Other grading policies:
- In each grade category I will drop your lowest score. This includes an assignment or test you missed completely, whether due to illness or the generally overwhelming burden of trying to learn during a pandemic.
- Students are expected to abide by University regulations regarding academic honesty. Use of resources (online or otherwise) is permitted, as long as these are properly cited. Getting someone else to do your work for you is not permitted.
- If we determine that you cheated on an assignment or test (through plagiarism, copying, online “study” sites, etc.) you will receive a grade of zero on that grade item, and you will not be able to drop that grade item as your lowest grade in that category.
Each of the grade components above will be assigned a numerical score. These will be added to get a score out of 100. Your score out of 100 is converted into a letter grade according to the following table.
| A+ | A | A- | B+ | B | B- | C+ | C | C- | D+ | D | F |
| 98-100 | 93-97 | 90-92 | 86-89 | 80-85 | 77-79 | 73-76 | 68-72 | 64-67 | 60-63 | 50-59 | 0-49 |
moodle.uleth.cawww.cs.uleth.ca/~fitzpat/teaching.htmlopentext.uleth.caopentext.uleth.ca/apex-accelerated/part-calculus-II.htmlwww.chapters.indigo.ca/en-ca/books/mathematics-for-human-flourishing/9780300237139-item.htmlwww.chapters.indigo.ca/en-ca/books/change-is-the-only-constant/9780316509084-item.htmluleth.syzygy.caIn certain cases where group work could impose undue hardship on an individual student, I am willing to consider execeptions to group work.
