MATH 241, Section F1H, Spring 2012
Calculus III Honors

Professor A.J. Hildebrand
http://www.math.illinois.edu/~hildebr/241/

Basic Information

Date/time/room: : MTWR 2:00 - 2:50, 143 Henry Administration Building.
Instructor: A.J. Hildebrand, phone 244-7721, email ajh@illinois.edu. When sending email, include the string "Math 241" in the subject line. My office is 241 Illini Hall. You are welcome to stop by any time (I am in most of the time when I am not teaching or in meetings), or email me (ajh@illinois.edu) to make an appointment. However, I intend the "Open House" (see below) to be the primary point of contact for the students in my classes, and I encourage you to take advantage of this opportunity.
Open House/Study Sessions: Tentatively scheduled for Tuesdays, 5 pm - 6:30 pm, and Sundays, 3 pm - 5 pm, in 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; I may add additional Open House hours if there is enough interest.
Final Exam date: Wednesday, May 9, 2012, 7:00 pm - 10:00 pm. Please keep this date in mind when making travel plans.

Course Information

Text and syllabus: Stewart, Calculus, 6th Edition. We will cover Chapters 12 - 16. The same text is used by the regular (large lecture) Math 241 sections, and by Math 231. If you took Math 231 last semester, you probably have the text already. Note: The bookstores carry both the 6th Edition and the 7th Edition. Make sure you get the 6th Edition, which is the one with the blue/black cover - the 7th Edition has a white cover.
Purchasing the text: If you buy a new copy the Stewart text at local bookstores, it will come bundled with an access card to Enhanced WebAssign, which provides access to an electronic version of the entire Stewart text and a variety of other online materials, as well as access to an online student solution manual, a total value of over $300. You will get all of this for around $160 at the local college bookstores (Illini Union Bookstore, TIS, Folletts) thanks to a special deal that the Math Department negotiated with the publisher. The deal is only available through local bookstores or directly through the publisher. More information on purchasing the text can be found at this page.

Note: Because of the bundle deal, buying a new copy bundled with the WebAssign card makes more economic sense than buying a used one. A used copy most likely does not have the Webassign access card, and hence does not provide you access to the various online materials that you get with the bundle. While you do not need WebAssign for doing the homework (because of the small class size, I do not plan on using the online homework system), it is worth purchasing because of the other online materials that you get with it.
About this course: This is an honors sections of Math 241, the third semester calculus course. It qualifies for honors credit for students in the James Scholar or Campus Honors programs. The course is taught in small sections, run by professors rather than TA's. Enrollment is strictly limited and requires approval by the Undergraduate Math Office. (Go to 313 Altgeld Hall or email mathadvising@illinois.edu for more information.)
Differences to the standard Math 241: The honors sections of Math 241 cover roughly the same material as the regular 241 sections, at a similar pace, but in greater depth. They are more challenging, more labor-intensive, but also intellectually more rewarding, than the standard version of 241. For example, we will cover theoretical material that in standard sections would often be skipped, we will do some proofs, and the homework assignments will include more difficult, "honors level", problems.
This course is not for everyone. It requires a significant commitment of time and effort - probably more so than any other course you will be taking this semester - and you have to be willing and able to make such a commitment. If you are taking calculus simply because it's a required course, or if you just want to acquire a working knowledge of calculus to apply to other fields (there is absolutely nothing wrong with those motivations), you may be better served by standard 241 classes. However, if you want to get challenged beyond the routine and experience the satisfaction you get from solving such challenges, if you are not intimidated by occasional excursions into n-dimensional space and epsilon-delta definitions, and if you are curious about what goes on behind the scenes and why a particular formula or recipe works, this may be the right course for you.
Be sure to read the separate page, Math 241 F1H Honors FAQ, which has more information about the "honors" character of this course and should help you decide whether this course is right for you.
Getting into this course:. Enrollment in honors sections is strictly limited, requires departmental approval as well as meeting certain prerequisites, such as top scores on AP exams or top grades in Calc I and II. The course tends to fill up quickly. If you are not registered and are trying to get in, (1) you have to meet the requirements, (2) you have get the appropriate departmental approval, and (3) there has to be a space available in at least one of the sections; send email to mathadvising@illinois.edu for more information. Note that I have no control over registrations, I cannot open up spots if the class is full, or grant the required departmental approval. You will need to see the Undergraduate Advisors in 313 Altgeld for this.
Switching sections: This class is not for everybody. If you find that you are in over your head in this class, or the workload is getting too much for you, you should consider dropping the class and switching to a standard (non-honors) Math 241 section. The sooner you do this, the easier it is. Don't wait till the middle of the semester before making that decision; by then, it will be too late to switch to another section, and dropping the class may require special approval by the Dean.
If you are struggling early on in the course, don't expect things to get easier later in the semester. In fact, the first chapter in the syllabus (Chapter 12) is the easiest of all; it gets harder in subsequent chapters. If you have difficulties with the early material, switching right away may be in your best interest.

Grading

Course grade: Your course grade will be determined by the accumulated points total from homework, quizzes, midterm exams, and the final exam. An approximate breakdown of the points total is as follows:
- Regular Homework: 150 points
- Honors Homework: 75 points
- Quizzes: 50 points
- Midterm Exams: 300 points (100 points per exam)
- Final Exam: 200 points
I do not use a preset curve, or aim for specific percentages of each grade. The cutoffs for letter grades will be set at the end of the semester and will depend on the overall performance of the class, the difficulty of the tests, and the location of clusters of scores and gaps between such clusters. In any case, the cutoffs will be no worse than the standard 90/80/70/60 percent curve for A/B/C/D grades. If you end up with 90 percent of the maximal total number of points, you are guaranteed at least an A-; a score of 80 percent will guarantee at least a B-; and so on. The actual cutoffs will likely be more generous, and more favorable to you. For example, the cutoff for an A grade (A- or better) usually ends up in the mid to upper 80s, the cutoff for a B grade in the low to mid 70s, etc.
Regular Homework: There will be weekly graded HW assignments consisting of problems from the Stewart text. 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" below). At the end of the semester, the two lowest HW scores will be dropped; the remaining HW scores will determine your HW total.
Honors Homework: In addition to the regular homework assignments, there will be 4 - 6 Honors Homework assignment sets consisting of more challenging honors level problems. There will be no drop scores among the honors assignments, but the assignments will have generous deadlines and liberal turn-in policies. You must work on these assignments on your own; group work on the Honors Homework is not allowed.
Group work policy: Group work on the regular (non-honors) homework problems is fine and, indeed, encouraged, provided you write up solutions yourself, using your own words. Group work should not be a one-sided affair, and it also should not be a division of labor, with each group member doing only a subset of the problems and passing out solutions to the rest of the group. Everybody should contribute, and the goal should be for everyone in the group to end up understanding all of the problems.
Quizzes: About once a week I will give a short quiz with one or two questions on something that came up in class or in the homework during the past few class hours. Anyone who attends class and keeps up with the material should have no problem acing the quizzes; in fact, the main point of these quizzes is to serve as an incentive for you to do just that - attend class, and keep up with the material. (Note that the quizzes are not meant to be miniature exams; quiz questions are usually too easy and too straightforward to make suitable exam problems.) As with the (regular) homework, there is a generous drop score policy: At the end of the semester, the two lowest quiz scores will be dropped, and the remaining scores determining your quiz points total. Thus, you can afford to miss two quizzes without affecting your overall quiz total.
Midterm exams: There will be three in-class midterm exams, spaced evenly over the semester. Tentative dates for these midterms are February 15, March 7, and April 18. (All of these dates fall on a Wednesday.)
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 3-3:50 classes: Wednesday, May 9, 2012, 7:00 pm - 10:00 pm.
Note: University rules require that you take the Final Exam at the assigned slot for the class, unless you are in a ``three consecutive finals'' situation (in which case you are entitled to a conflict exam by one of the classes involved). In particular, you cannot take the Final at a different date/time simply to accommodate travel plans. Please keep the above Final date in mind when making your travel plans.

Policies

Missed exams and quizzes: There will be no make-up tests. Instead, if you miss an exam (or quiz) 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 two lowest homework scores will be dropped, you can afford to miss two homework assignments 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 score).
Calculator policy: Calculators are not allowed in exams; the exam problems will be written such that they do not require a calculator; calculators would be a hindrance and distraction, and in most cases completely useless. You do not need to bring a calculator to class. (I don't carry a calculator with me either.) Occasionally, you may need a calculator to do a homework problem, though the majority of homework problems will be of the no-calculator variety. For the calculator problems, a basic calculator is sufficient; you do not need graphing or programmable calculators.

What I expect from you

Remember this is an honors class, aimed at the best and brightest students. With it come many benefits, but also high expectations on the students. I will do my best to make this class an interesting, stimulating, challenging, and rewarding learning experience. In return, I expect you to conduct yourself in a manner worthy of an honors student. In particular, you must:

Commit a significant amount of time to this class. This class requires a significant time commitment - more than a regular Math 241 section, and probably more than any of the other classes you will be taking this semester. You should plan on spending at least ten hours per week outside the classroom in studying, reviewing class notes, preparing for the next class, and working on assignments. If you are not able to make such a commitment, you should consider another class.
Attend class. I expect you to attend class. Skipping classes shows a lack of commitment and disrespect. The same goes for chatting, texting, or websurfing during classtime. I take my duties as instructor seriously and put a lot of effort into preparing lectures, and I expect students to be respectful of this effort. While in large lecture sections you may get away skipping the lectures without anyone noticing, in small honors classes, absences do get noticed. (If you have to miss a class for a legitimate reasons such as illness, send me an email so that I know why you are not there.)
Take studying seriously. Set aside regular times for studying, reviewing your class notes, and doing any assigned reading. I will frequently assign sections from the text that you should study on your own. These reading assignments complement the lectures, and doing them is necessary to keep up with the pace of the course.
Be intellectually honest. This means that you should not cheat on exams, and you should do the homework assignments on your own, without any outside help, and without consulting books and online sources, unless group work or other assistance is explicitly permitted. If you try to find the solution to a homework problem by googling, you are being dishonest, you are doing yourself a disservice, and you are missing out on an opportunity to learn something by trying the problem on your own.
Be intellectually curious. This class covers all of core material of Calc III, and it provides a working knowledge of the key concepts, results, and techniques needed for applications, but it goes beyond that by developing some of the underlying theory and showing why things work and why formulas are the way they are. One of the highlights will be a neat theory that ties together the key integral theorems in Calc III and the Fundamental Theorem of Calculus from Calc I, and shows that all of these theorems are special cases of a single theorem of remarkably simple form. To appreciate this, you must have a genuine interest in learning for learning's sake and the intellectual curiosity to want to know the "why's" and behind-the-scenes stuff, even if it is not going to be on any test (as is the case with much of the foundational material).
Be open to some level of abstractness. We will be doing some formal proofs, introduce abstract definitions, and often work in more abstract settings such as that of an n-dimensional space. You must be open to such a more abstract way of doing mathematics. If you hate proofs, or are afraid of epsilons and deltas, this class is not for you.

Course Web Page

The web page for this course is http://www.math.illinois.edu/~hildebr/241. I will post here announcements, and a class diary with hw assignments and a brief summary of what I did in class. You should bookmark this page and check it on a regular basis.

Back to the Course Homepage

Last modified Mon 16 Jan 2012 06:30:36 PM CST A.J. Hildebrand