ANNOUNCEMENTS
MTH 254H — Spring 2015

6/6/15

If you have questions before the exam, you are welcome to go to Corinne Manogue's office hours in Weniger 493.

She expects to be there on Monday from 10 AM – 3 PM, apart from an hour for lunch (probably 12–1 PM).

6/4/15

The final will be Tuesday 6/9/15 from 12:00–1:50 PM in Wngr 149.

• The final will be slightly less than twice as long as the midterm
• It will cover material from the entire course, but with an emphasis on material since the midterm.
• The main new topics (roughly 55–65% of the exam) are:
  • vectors & vector functions;
  • partial derivatives;
  • gradient;
  • optimization;
• The old material (roughly 35–45%) is described below in the midterm announcement.
• Together, these topics correspond roughly to §11, §12, & §13 in Briggs/Cochran.
• You may bring two 3″×5″ index cards (both sides) of handwritten notes, or the equivalent.
• Other rules are as announced below for the midterm.
• Friday's lecture will be devoted to review. Come prepared to ask questions!

5/27/15

Lab writeup for Friday:

Write up your group's work on today's activity ("The Roller Coaster").

A good thing to add would be a brief comment/discussion about how the results of this activity might help you solve the homework problem you turned in today.

A new section in the online book that discusses where the second derivative test comes from can be found here.

5/21/15

My office hour tomorrow (Friday) afternoon will be in Weniger 495.

5/20/15

Lab writeup for Friday:

Write up your group's work on today's activity ("The Gold Mine").

If your group addressed the "Go" question, please summarize what you did, but you do not need to answer all 3 questions.

5/15/15

There is homework this week!

My attempt to post this week's assignment last weekend clearly didn't succeed, although I did not notice until after class today. I will therefore accept the current assignment through Wednesday, 5/20, although I recommend completing it this weekend if possible. My apologies for the confusion.

5/14/15

Tomorrow afternoon's office hour is canceled (due to a UHC thesis defense).

I will likely be in my office from 11–11:30 AM and from 1–1:20 PM, but if you want to be sure of catching me please contact me via email beforehand. I will be available after class if needed.

5/13/15

Lab writeup for Friday:

Write up your group's work on today's activity ("Directional Derivatives").

Good things to include are a discussion of how accurate you think your measurements were (and why), and whether your results agree with last week's measurements from the Hillside lab.

5/9/15

Lab writeup for Monday:

Write up your group's work on Friday's activity ("The Hillside").

Do the homework assignment first; let me know if you need more time.

5/6/15

Lab writeup for Friday:

Write up your group's work on Monday's activity ("Chain Rule Measurements").

A copy of this activity is available here; a copy of the previous activity ("Resistors") is available here.

4/26/15

In addition to my usual office hour tomorrow (1:30–2:30 PM), I should be in my office from roughly 11–11:45 AM.

4/25/15

A list of the most important rules for differentiation and integration, written using differentials, can be found here.

4/21/15

Lab writeup for Wednesday:

Write up your group's work on yesterday's activity ("The Hot Plate").
(Apologies for the late post.)

4/19/15

Here are some additional sections of the textbook that you may want to read:

• Non-Constant Limits of Integration
• Polar Coordinates
• Double Integrals in Polar Coordinates
• Review of Multiple Integration

These sections have been linked retroactively to the schedule.

4/18/15

The midterm will be Monday 4/27/15 in class.

• The main topic to be covered on the midterm is multiple integration.
  (There may also be some elementary questions on partial differentiation — watch for further announcements.)
• The exam is closed book, and calculators may not be used.
• You may bring one 3″×5″ index card (both sides) of handwritten notes.
• Please write your exams in pencil or black ink (blue ink is OK).
• Please turn off all electronic devices, such as cell phones and alarms; this also includes personal music players.
• Friday's class will be devoted to review. Come prepared to ask questions!

4/17/15

Lab writeup for Monday:

Write up your group's work on today's activity ("The Cone").

• Give at least two different integrals, complete with limits, and describe how the cone is being chopped up in each case.
• Feel free to include integrals that were not discussed by your group, but please label them as such.
• Not all of the integrals need to be triple integrals...
• The more integrals you include, the better—there are at least half a dozen.
• Evaluate at least one of these integrals (preferably a triple integral).
• Did you get the correct answer?

4/15/15

We will continue the Cone activity on Friday.

A lab writeup will be due Monday, along with this week's HW.

The midterm will be in class on Monday, 4/27.

Further information will be posted here soon.

4/8/15

Lab writeup for Friday:

Write up a short description of your group's work on today's activity ("Integration").

• Please complete the computation as a single integral, chopping both ways.
• Comments about how to evaluate the integrals as double integrals will earn brownie points.

4/8/15

My office hour this coming Monday afternoon, 4/13, is canceled.

I will be out of town early next week, but feel free to contact me via email with any questions.

4/1/15

Lab writeup for Friday:

Write up a short description of your group's work on problem 1 of today's lab ("The Heater").

• See the guidelines on the homework page and also here.
• Lab writeups are a relatively small part of your grade; don't stress out now trying to get it just right.

A reasonable length for your complete writeup is one side of one page.

3/28/15

Another resource you may find helpful:

• Online tutorials covering both precalculus and calculus can be found here.

3/24/15

Below are some resources you may find helpful.

• Online materials suitable for reviewing precalculus concepts can be found here.
• Several standard calculus textbooks are on reserve in the Valley Library, including Briggs/Cochran (the current text in MTH 254) and Hughes Hallett (the previous text).
  You are strongly encouraged to use one or both of these books regularly as a source of practice problems. The Hughes Hallett text in particular has "Exercises", which are more-or-less routine, "Problems", which are more conceptual, and "Check Your Understanding" questions at the end of each chapter, which are True/False questions that can be surprisingly difficult. See me if you are having difficulty choosing appropriate problems.
• Both Maple and Mathematica are available in the math computer lab in the back of Kidder 108.
  Wolfram Alpha is of course also available online.

3/23/15

Here are some suggestions for improving the presentation of your written work:

• Restate the problem in your own words.
• Use (mostly) complete sentences (with the math included as grammatically correct parts).
• Don't write a book — keep it short and sweet.
• Don't use scratch paper; use blue or black ink (or pencil).
• Don't use a multicolumn format.

The goal of your writeups should be to be able to understand them 5 years from now without any additional information.

Further information is available at the top of the homework page.
The criteria I will use to evaluate written work can be found here.

3/22/15

My office hours are posted on the course homepage.

Clicking on the calendar icon on that page will bring up my full weekly schedule, which is also available here.

3/21/15

The grading policy has been altered slightly.

2/11/15

Make sure you read the note about textbooks, and take a look at the grading policy.

I reserve the right to make small changes to these rules.