TO THE SPRING 2006 STUDENT OF COLLEGE ALGEBRA [13024] CONTINUED

Section information:
MTH 160B.601 meeting on Mon., Tue., Wed. & Thur. from 10:00 to 10:50 a.m. in SO 111

StLCC @ Meramec Web Pages URL http://www.stlcc.cc.mo.us/mcdocs/



PREQUISITE: MTH 140 with C, B or A or a satisfactory score on the Acuplacer placement test, ACT or SAT. Students from other institutions must provide appropriate documentation for enrollment to the instructor on or before Friday, January 20, 2006.

CALCULATOR REQUIRED: This section will require the use of a TI-83 or TI-83 PLUS or TI-83 Silver or a TI-84 or TI-84 PLUS or TI-84 Silver graphing calculator to help learn the topics of this course and on tests.

TIME ON COURSE: The four class hours and project time you spend on this course each week will require about fourteen homework hours per week for high grades to around nine hours per week for passing grades. It is best to construct a time schedule for each week of the course and mark out the study time you plan. A plan gives you the needed ten to fifteen hours indicated above. This time commitment is a pledge you make for yourself for the personal obligation you have undertaken to learn this mathematics. Your instructor expects you to be prepared with homework done or near done each day.

ADDITIONAL MATERIALS: TI-8X "Graphing Calculator Manual" for the above textbook by Judith A. Penna and graph paper.

ADDITIONAL STUDY AIDS: Before the end of the first week take the Skills Test for beginning College Algebra found in the Mathematics Department's Syllabus. You should get 80% of the questions right or else consider repeating Intermediate Algebra to master necessary skills for College Algebra.

The student answer key on reserve in the library has more than just the answers. Additional lectures are available on computers in SW 110.

Computer software may be used in SW 110 and I will help you with this mathematics software when needed. A computer memory disk or USB memory chip is good to have for your computer work.

The mathematics department provides free tutoring located in room SW 211 and other places. Other library materials are available. Tutoring is also offered at the South County Education Center and the West County Education Center. You may obtain individual peer tutoring through the College Success Program. Instructional videotapes are available for use in the Library Learning Lab.

Please read SUGGESTIONS ON HOW TO STUDY MATH of the Mathematics Department's Syllabus.

Please see me as soon as possible for any personal accommodations you require.

CHAUTAUQUA

TYPICAL CLASS PERIOD: The first part of class time is open for answering student questions about the previous assignment including exercises, reading material, or classroom notes. Add your questions to the class day's START UP LIST. You are encouraged to help answer other student's questions or show your solutions by presenting chalk board work. While presenting information is expected, this communication is not graded. Use this time to experiment with your ability to understand an exercise and convey your understanding to others. Your frequent involvement will help you practice many of the activities covered in your general and specific goals covered later in this syllabus and generally aid your understanding of the problems of the course. Don't worry about mistakes you may make, that's included in this part. In fact, the first student that finds and reports a given textbook or answer key mistake on the day's attendance sheet may have a point extra credit for that discovery.

Another part of class is used to introduce new material with examples, discussion and demonstrations or proofs. I assume that prior to the class in which new material is introduced that you took notes as you read from the new textbook sections and practiced the new vocabulary.

You may wish to include the textbook examples in your class questions of new material as your instructor will cover these ideas and concepts and do additional examples.

Some class time is spent with all students working at the chalk board, some class time is spent working on PROJECTS both in teams and individual. Some class time is spent in the computer room SW 110.

TEAM ACTIVITIES: Some class time is devoted to team work on PROJECTS aimed at a deeper understanding of some course topics or their applications. Your instructor will assign you to a team and assign team coordinators. A grade will result from this team work and each student must hand in their report to be graded. When working on a team, students are to think for themselves treating the instructor as a guide, consultant, coach and evaluator to the team. Always try to approach your team time with a knowledgeable position based on your personal studies. During team activity, you should display a willingness to generate discussion that leads to answers or more refined questions that converge to solutions to your team assignment.

You may be in the dark on some points but being open to change and willing to communicate your points even if mistaken at first helps the team toward the final goals while helping you toward greater clarity. At times we need team work to derive all the answers or computations in some assignments. And other times teams provide a natural background for discussion of the material and presentation of solutions. You are expected to help your team reach reasonable objectives on time and demonstrate to your instructor that you are participating on your team in a meaningful way. Also, teams may wish to work as a study group covering daily assignments. This can be implemented via your telephone or computer networking.

Individual communication is not permitted in class. Please note that individual communication is not very productive while another person is speaking in a group or class room situation.

EXPECTATIONS: This syllabus including its Course Schedule (below), the Mathematics Department's Syllabus including an Objectives and Assignments section and Policies combined with the St. Louis Community College student academic Rights and Responsibilities and study guide information, covered in the FACT FINDER, are basic expectations for this course. These items will give you a sense of the quality that your instructor works to achieve in this course. Please see me as soon as possible for any personal accommodations you require and please keep in mind that: The quickest way to resolve any difficulty, no matter how small, is to let your instructor know about it as soon as possible.

SPECIFIC EXPECTATIONS: You are expected to read the textbook and take notes from the textbook before the class in which the material is covered. Add to these notes or take separate notes covering the new material and activities in each class. Then finish the assigned exercises by doing all the odd exercises for the following class except perhaps a few of the more difficult exercises that you should ask about in the next class and then finish. Put your list of studied but unsolved problems on the class day's START UP LIST. Definitely ask for individual help when needed particularly if you can not work large portions of the exercises. Review processes you used to solve home work exercises and practice vocabulary each day. You will need to stay on top of your work and be able to adequately prepare for the unit test coming in a few days. This generally means you need to develop a dogged attitude with more than several hours per day spent on solving exercises, keeping good notes from the text and class, and doing plenty of daily reviewing likely including some daily memorization. Give yourself a short test of five problems each day! Use your personal weekly study schedule sheet to keep track of finished work and extra credit points. If you need help, I am located in the mathematics department during office hours or you may call my home telephone number before 9:30 p.m. This course takes lots of gumption.

SOME GENERAL GOALS: Learning in this course may be enhanced by your frequent willingness to use and thereby improve various attributes related to knowing or learning mathematics.

Print and consider this Web list (http://jug.net/wt/mgoals.htm) while you strive for excellence in understanding mathematical ideas and develop corresponding techniques. Practice helpful activities and general goals by experimenting with ones that may help you increase learning or make learning more meaningful and pleasant. Reorganize your methods and even style of learning for deeper understanding and interest. Pursue the lines of inquiry that you find your mind selects naturally while not diverging from the outline of course material too far. It is OK to spend large amounts of time studying just a few ideas, pages, or problems and as a matter of fact extra study time is YOUR MAGIC for learning mathematics. Also give yourself personal permission for making lots of mistakes. Use the criterion of "when time seems to flow" as your gauge for individual development to realize a sense of accomplishment then personal complexity may change as well. Don't get stuck or stay stuck! Help yourself to be an expressive engaged learner, that is, "do all you can do".

* Keep pencil, calculator or computer, personal weekly study schedule sheet and lots of just plain scratch paper next to you when doing your math to actively fill in the details of ideas.


SPECIFIC ALGEBRA GOALS: Know and apply the algebra properties found in this course. Some initial specific algebra properties you need for this course are but a click away.

ASSIGNMENTS and NOTES: Your problem assignments, text notes and class notes are checked during regular test times. Turn in your notebook as you enter the test time and take it with you when you leave the test. All material should be in sequential textbook order. Seven extra credit points = 3 for completely worked homework exercises + 2 points for textbook notes + 2 points for class notes are given via a quick review of the thoroughness and spot checked for accuracy of your work.



PROJECTS: Individual and team project assignments are required and count in your course grade. A grade rubric will be discussed in class.

Projects may be used from Mr. Thayer's Web Pages found on URLs http://jug.net/wt/ , http://mth.bz and http://eorl.net/ehome/cdm.htm. If you find a page in these sites that you would like to do for extra credit, print out a copy and show it to your instructor, Mr. Thayer. You will find out how many extra credit points it would count for you and some details about the work.

Additionally, some extra credit exercises and reports are suggested during the course and carry the amount of extra credit points ssigned with the given work. CLASS EXTRA CREDIT: You may give yourself one point extra credit on the day's attendance sheet for each problem you put on the board. You may give yourself one point extra credit for each error you find in the textbook or in the answer key as long as you document what the error is and show the page number next to your one point on that day's attendance sheet.

CHANGES: Some additions, substitutions and/or corrections to this syllabus will be made during the course.

Copyright © 2006 with all rights reserved by William V. Thayer