Instructor: Randy McCarthy, 244-7307, randy@math.uiuc.edu
Office Hour: W at 10; by appointment; or if my door is open stop in and I'll see you or tell you when I can.
Text: Calculus from Graphical, Numerical, and Symbolic Points of View, volume 1, A. Ostebee and P. Zorn, Saunders College Publishing.
Other Necessary Stuff: You should have a graphing calculator. If you do not already own one the TI-82 is a suitable model to purchase. The TI-82 is the calculator that will be used during classroom demonstrations. However, if you already own a different calculator, the chances are that it will do just fine.
Bring your text and calculator to every class.
Small Group Learning Methods: You will spend a large amount of each class working on problems in a group with three or four other classmates. On average, the lecture will take only about 15 minutes of each class. The purpose of the lecture will be to introduce the material of the day and/or to clarify some point that is bothering the class. During the rest of the class the instructor will circulate among the working groups to see how you are doing and to provide some guidance when necessary. In other words, you will be actively doing mathematics (gasp!) instead of passively listening to a lecture. Participation in this group work is very important and it will play a part in your grade. Please pay careful attention to the detailed syllabus:
It is expected that you will have read each section of the text before the class where it is to be discussed.
Effective participation in the class will be impossible for you if you have not read the assigned textbook material in advance. At the end of each class, your group for that day will turn in its work and the entire group will receive the same grade of 0,1 or 2. We also have a two hour lab once a week. In this lab you will work on more challenging projects with a more stable group. That is, these groups will change only after each hour exam and will otherwise remain fixed. Each student will turn in a solution of which ONLY ONE will be graded and once again the entire group will receive the same grade (out of 10 possible points). The instructor may occasionally give an individual a lower score then their group when the individual's participation is very poor.
Mastery Testing: The second hour exam will be different from the other three hour exams and the final exam. It will examine your mastery of some very basic skills that are absolutely essential for success in later life--well OK, at least in later courses which have this calculus as a prerequisite. You must demonstrate mastery of these skills at the 90\% level or better in order to get any passing credit for this exam; if you do not reach 90\% the first time, then you may take a repeat exam. These repeat exams will be given weekly three more times. The following penalty applies for repeats: your score for this exam will be reduced by 10 points (out of 100 points) for each retake that is needed to reach the 90\% level. Note that your recorded grade for this exam will be {\cap ZERO} if you do not reach the 90\% success level on one of the mastery exam retakes. Most students will not need more than one retake. By the way--the mastery exam, unlike the others, must be taken without the aid of your calculator.
Homework: Homework will be assigned every class and solutions due at the beginning of the next class hour (except, of course, on exam days). A problem or two will be graded and the graded assignments will be returned the following day (grades will be 0,1 or 2 per assignment).
A small compensation for this unreasonable policy is that the worse 6 homework grades will not be counted towards the homework grade.
Grades: Grades will NOT be curved. Potentially every student can get an A. The various pieces of your graded work will be used to compute your final grade for the course by the following formula:
10 % Daily homework
10 % Daily group work (in class)
10 % Lab work (Wed., 3-5)
10 % Exam I
10 % Exam II (Mastery Exam)
10 % Exam III
10 % Exam IV
30 % Final (May 16, 8--11 a.m.)