STLHE 2018 — Day 2 — We Gave the Talk!
We gave the talk! The slides are available here:
Start, Stop, Continue and Ticket Out of the Door: Collecting and
using student feedback to improve teaching in a large first-year math
class by Xinli Wang and Parker Glynn-Adey (University of Toronto Mississauga).
It worked out great and we got lots of good feedback about feedback! Afterwards, I attended: Design Thinking as Method, Madness & Mindset by Farhad Dastur of Kwantlen Polytechnic University. We did the marshmallow tower challenge, and it was super fun. We started building early on and managed to cooperate well under pressure. Photos below the cut.
I also had a lovely chat with Diana Skzrydlo, where she outlined her work on teaching students Markov chains by having them play a simulation game. You can read a bit about it at the bottom of her teaching blog here.
Some photos from the day are below the cut.
STLHE 2018 — Day 1 — Pre-Conference
Lots of great ideas today! Ahg! It was amazing. I went to a workshop on conducting SoTL research. That was the first session of the pre-conference, and it made the whole conference worth while. I am thrilled.
Some great references and guides:
- Calgary Guide to SoTL (Yo! Mike Pawliuk!)
- Vanderbuilt Guide to SoTL
Journals that are highly connected to the conference:
- Canadian Journal for the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning
- Collected Essays on Learning and Teaching
Some reference to track down in Toronto:
- Creswell, J.W. (2013). Qualitative inquiry and research design: choosing among five approaches.
- Louis Cohen, Lawrence Manion, and Keith Morrison (2011). Research methods in education.
- Martella Ronald , Nelson J Ron , Morgan Robert et al. (2013). Understanding and Interpreting Educational Research
STLHE 2018 — Day 0 — Introduction
I am currently at Scholarship of Teaching and Learning in Higher Education 2018 in Sherbrooke, QC. The plan is to post a short little video everyday of the conference to keep people updated on how things are going. Stay tuned!
MAT B41 — Week 6
Term Test is this Friday. Reading week is next week!
We have a modified class schedule this week.
- Tuesday: Taylor Series and Review.
- Thursday: Class Survey and Work Period, everyone is invited to bring problems to practice.
- Friday: Term Test, will be held Friday afternoon.
Term Test Policy
From the Course Syllabus, we have the following policy:
The Term Test will be written outside of regular lecture hours. If you cannot attend reasons of creed or religion, then you will must contact Parker as early as possible to arrange for an alternative sitting. If you miss the midterm test for medical reasons, you must contact Parker within 24 hours of the test.
You will need to send a UTSC Verification of Student Illness or Injury form:
Students who miss the midterm test will be asked to provide the Verification Form and a timetable for the next five days. You will be given only one opportunity to write the make-up test.
Parker scheduled to the midterm to avoid Ramadan, but he forgot about Eid Al-Fitr. If you want to celebrate Eid with your family, instead of writing the midterm at the usual time, please contact Parker immediately.
The Week after Reading Week!
Parker will be traveling to STLHE 2018 and the IBL Workshop.
Our Tuesday evening lecture will be delivered by Ivan Khatchatourian.
Our Thursday morning lecture will be delivered by Ray Grinnell.
MAT B41 — Week 5
Mock Midterm this Friday 12-2pm in IC 130. Midterm Test next week!
Several people asked about Question 7 off of Homework #3. The intent of the question was for 
Additional resources:
- Wikipedia on Clairaut’s theorem
- Khan Academy on Second Partial Derivatives
- Krista King on Second Partial Derivatives
- PatrickJMT on Second Partial Derivatives
- ThreeBlueOneBrown on Single Variable Taylor Series
- Mark Ancliff on Multivariate Taylor Series
Suggested Exercises:
- 3.1 Iterated Partial Derivatives: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 12, 14, 15, 16
- 3.2 Taylor’s Theorem: 1, 2, 5, 9
Past Term Tests:
2016 Term Test:
Give the 4th degree Taylor polynomial about the origin of 
2015 Term Test:
- Compute the 4th degree Taylor polynomial about the origin of
.
- Find the linear approximation to the function
at the point
and use it to estimate
.
Notes:
MAT 134 — Post-Term Test #1 Survey
Thank you for filling out MAT 134 Post-Term Test #1 Survey.
Here is what Parker learned about the class!
MAT B41 — Week 4
Homework 2 is due! Homework 3 (tex) is now available.
Midterm information:
- Mock Term Test Friday 8 June @ 12:00-2:00 PM in IC-130
- Real Term Test Friday 15 June @ 3:00-5:00 PM in IC-130/230
All questions regarding format, question allocation, style of test, will be addressed by the Mock Term Test. I highly recommend you attend the Mock Term Test, because it will be the perfect preparation for the Real Term Test. More information will be available early next week.
In order to prepare for the Term Test, I recommend attempting the suggested exercises.
Additional resources:
- Khan Academy on partial derivatives.
- PatrickJMT on partial derivatives.
- KristaKing on partial derivatives.
- Eugene Khutoryansky explains gradients and partial derivatives. (Beautiful animation!)
- Educational Videos explains gradients and partial derivatives.
Suggested Exercises:
- 2.3 Differentiation: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 19, 22, 24, 25 (Do as much as possible.)
- 2.5 Properties of Derivatives: 2, 3, 6, 14, 17
- 2.6 Gradients and Directional Derivatives: 1, 4, 6, 10, 11, 19
Past Term Tests:
2016 Term Test: Let 
- Find an equation for the tangent plane to the graph
at the point
.
- Find the direction of maximum increase in
at the point
2015 Term Test:
- Determine the rate of change in
as you move from
towards
.
- Compute the directional derivative of
at the point
in the direction of the upward normal for the plane
.
Notes:
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