Math 213, Section F1, Fall 2010
Basic Discrete Mathematics
Professor A.J. Hildebrand
http://www.math.illinois.edu/~hildebr/213/

General Information

• Date/time/location: MWF 2:00 - 2:50, 147 Altgeld Hall
• Instructor: A.J. Hildebrand, phone 244-7721, email ajh@illinois.edu. When sending email, include the string "Math 213" in the subject line.
• Office Hours: My office is in 241 Illini Hall; I am available most of the time when I am not teaching; send email to ajh@illinois.edu to make an appointment. Also, take advantage of my "Open House" (see below), which I intend to be the primary point of contact for my students.
• Open House/Study Sessions: Tentatively scheduled for Wednesdays/Thursdays, 5 pm - 6:30 pm, 159 Altgeld Hall, beginning the second week of class. The Open House is intended as an informal office hour and get-together for students in my classes. Take advantage of this opportunity! Check the course webpage for any announcements or changes in the Open House schedule.
• Final Exam date: Friday, December 17, 2010, 1:30 pm - 4:30 pm.
  NOTE: This slot is the officially assigned Final Exam slot for classes meeting MWF 2-2:50. It happens to fall on the last day of the Final Exams period, but that's just the luck of the draw - I have no say in this matter. Please keep this date in mind when making travel plans. University regulations are very strict in requiring students to take the Final at the assigned slot. Deviations are granted only in exceptional cases and require approval by the Provost's Office. In particular, you cannot take the Final at an earlier date to accommodate travel plans.

Course Information

• Text: The required text is "Discrete Mathematics and its Applications" by Kenneth H. Rosen, 6th edition, ISBN 9780073312712. There is an excellent companion website for this text, http://www.mhhe.com/rosen, with a large collection of additional materials, such as interactive demos, more examples, and self assessment tests, nearly all of it freely accessible.
  Alternate sources for the text. The bookstore price for the text is around $170 new, and $127 used. If you are on a tight budget, try online outlets such as Campusbooks.com, half.com, AbeBooks.com, TextbooksRus.com, or the local, student-run, Illini Book Exchange.
  Note: The best online deals are for so-called "International Editions". These editions come with different ISBN's and different covers, but are nearly identical in content to the standard edition and will likely do just fine. Occasionally, there are small differences in the exercises, so if you do end up with a nonstandard edition, make sure to check the homework problems against a standard edition (e.g., one of the copies on reserve in the Math library) to be sure you are doing the correct exercises.
• Syllabus: Below is the official departmental syllabus for this course. I intend to follow this syllabus closely, but I may deviate from it slightly on occasion, and the list below should therefore be only regarded as a first approximation to what I intend to cover. I will make up the final syllabus as we move along; refer to the lecture summaries posted on the course website for a list of sections and topics covered each day.
  • Chapter 2 (Basic Structures): Sections 2.1-2.3
  • Chapter 3 (Algorithms): Sections 3.1-3.3
  • Chapter 4 (Induction): Sections 4.1-4.2
  • Chapter 5 (Counting): Sections 5.1-5.5
  • Chapter 6 (Discrete Probability): Sections 6.1-6.3
  • Chapter 7 (Advanced Counting): Sections 7.1, 7.2, 7.5, 7.6
  • Chapter 8 (Relations): Sections 8.1, 8.3, 8.5
  • Chapter 9 (Graphs): Sections 9.1-9.9
  • Chapter 10 (Trees): Sections 10.1-10.5
• About this course: As you can tell from the above syllabus, this course covers a lot of territory, and you have to be prepared to invest a substantial amount of time into the course. One goal of the course is to serve as an introduction to the "discrete" part of mathematics, which includes areas such as logic, set theory, probability, number theory, combinatorics and graph theory. Discrete Mathematics is the main theoretical foundation of computer science and has applications to many other fields. Many of the concepts and techniques in Discrete Mathematics are motivated by important real-world applications. On the lighter side, Discrete Mathematics is also a rich source of interesting and fun problems and puzzles. (For an example, google "Kevin Bacon number": a decidedly light and fun topic, but one which has some important concepts lurking in the background.)
  A secondary goal of this course is to develop basic skills in mathematical reasoning and proof writing. The areas of Discrete Mathematics provide an ideal context for learning and practicing these skills.
• Related courses: A very similar course is CS 173, which uses the same text, with a slightly different syllabus that emphasizes more the algorithmic aspects. The courses are sufficiently close that you won't get credit for both Math 213 and CS 173. (You can find out more about CS 173 from their website. )
  Another related course is Math 347, a required course for Math majors, and a prerequisite for many advanced upper level Math courses. Math 347 covers many of the same topics in Discrete Mathematics as Math 213 (e.g., sets, functions, and induction), but in greater depth, and with more emphasis on proof writing.

Homework and Exams

• Daily assignments: I will give out daily reading assignments along with a list of suggested problems to work out on your own (but not turn in). These daily assignments are intended to complement and reinforce what I did in the lecture.
• Graded HW assignments: Graded homework will be assigned on a weekly basis, normally given out on Monday and due in class the following Friday. Assignments dropped off in mailboxes will not be accepted; however, you can turn in an assignment in my office, 241 Illini Hall, any time before the class hour in which it is due. Late assignments will not be accepted, but if you have a legitimate, documented, excuse for missing an assignment (e.g., illness), I will mark the assignment as excused (see the section "Missed/late homework policy" below). At the end of the semester, the lowest HW score will be dropped, and the remaining scores determine your HW total.
  Note on group work: It is fine with me if you do the homework in groups (indeed, I encourage group work), provided you write up solutions yourself, using your own words. Simply copying answers from another student's solutions would defy the purpose of the HW assignments, and assignments that are near carbon copies of someone else's assignment will not be counted.
• Midterm exams: There will be three midterms, spread out evenly over the semester. The first exam will come around mid September, the second around mid October, and the third in mid or late November. I will decide on precise dates early in the semester after polling the class.
• Final Exam: The Final Exam will be cumulative and will be about twice as long as a midterm. It will be given at the officially scheduled exam slot for MWF 2-2:50 classes: Friday, December 17, 2010, 1:30 pm - 4:30 pm. (See the Fall 2010 Final Exam schedule.)
  NOTE: Please keep the above Final date in mind when making your travel plans. University regulations are very strict in requiring students to take the Final at the assigned slot; deviations are granted only in exceptional cases and require approval by the Provost's Office. In particular, you cannot take the Final at an earlier date to accommodate travel plans.

Grading Policy

• Course grade: The course grade will be based on the accumulated points total from the weekly homework assignments,the midterm exams, and the final exam, weighted approximately as follows:
  • Homework: 1/6
  • Midterm Exams: 1/6 each (1/2 for all three midterms)
  • Final Exam: 1/3
• Missed exams: There will be no make-up exams. Instead, if you miss an exam and have a valid excuse, I will mark the exam as "excused". An "excused" exam means that this exam will not be taken into account in the computation of your grade, and the score total will be adjusted accordingly. Valid excuses include illness, an out-of-town job interview, etc., and must be documented by an "absence letter" issued by the Dean; call the Dean's office at 217-333-0050 or go to the office at 300 Turner Student Services Building, 610 East John Street, Champaign. For more information on this, see the Emergency Dean's website.
• Missed/late homework: Late homework will not be accepted. Since the lowest homework score will be dropped, you can afford to miss a homework assignment and still end up with a perfect homework average. If you cannot turn in an assignment due to illness or some other valid excuse, the same policy as for missed exams applies: With a Dean's letter ("absence letter") as documentation, I will mark the assignment as excused; that is, it will not count towards the homework average (and will also not affect your drop scores).

Study Tips

• Attend the lectures. Reading the text is no substitute for attending the lectures; while I plan to follow the general outline of the text, I will put my own spin on the material, usually using different examples, emphasizing topics that I feel are particularly important.
• Do the HW problems. The homework - both the graded weekly assignments, and the non-graded daily assignments - is an essential part of this course, and you should make sure to do the homework, including the non-graded homework.
• Do the reading assignments. The Rosen text has a wealth of examples and problems, excellent end-of-chapter summaries, and an amazing variety of supplementary materials available, both in print and on the web. For each lecture, I will indicate (and post on the course webpage) the sections/topics in the Rosen text that you should read up on. These reading assignments are mainly intended to reinforce the material already covered in class, but they may also include topics that I have not had time to cover in class, but which I expect you to know. You should take these reading assignments seriously; don't expect to get by just doing the HW problems. The book and the lectures complement each other, and you cannot neglect one or the other.

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