Math Tests

I thought this was highly relevant ... not only is it good advice for, *ahem*, certain physics tests, it is also applicable to the GREs at least (and probably the MCAT, though I never took one myself).

The part about story problems is spot on. Read them like this at first: "Blah blah blah FIVE VOLTS blah blah TEN OHMS blah blah blah WHAT blah blah CURRENT." The answer is likely to be 0.5, independent of the blahs.

At least back in my day, the GRE math was almost identical to the SAT math. And story problems haven't changed much. "As I was going to St. Ives ..." (yes, that riddle in fact pre-dates Die Hard III)

Homework 3 is out

Here you go. It is due next Tuesday, 29 July.

We will do a couple of them in class tomorrow, and a few more on Friday.

Exam I results

Well, the exams are graded. You will get them back tomorrow, and we will go over the solutions.

No scaling was necessary - the average was 84.6%, with a standard deviation of 12.2. Very well done, better than expected. Here is a histogram, of sorts:


Since the exam was multiple choice, 20 questions long, each question was worth 5 points. Thus, saying the thing above is a histogram is being a bit too fancy; it is really just a plot of how many people got each score. Basically: many of you rocked the exam, and clearly studied. A smaller number of you did not rock the exam.

Now, if you are on the low end of the distribution, keep in mind that each exam is only 15% of your grade. Your homework, quizzes, and labs are all worth 15% each at the end of the class ... so a lower than expected exam score can easily be made up by doing well on the homework.

Basically: don't panic. It is still early enough. Be diligent about labs and homework, and things have a way of working out.

Below is a breakdown of the average score by question. Clearly, #20 was not your favorite. I suspect the problem was partly confusion of metric prefixes, and partly forgetting to take a square root ...



Perhaps not surprisingly, the questions I worked out in class today were quite easy for all of you ... a little present for showing up to lecture on the day of the exam, I guess.

And, by the way: we will go over new material tomorrow ...

Homework 2

Homework 2 is due tomorrow by 5pm. I will already be gone by then, so you have five options for turning it in:

• drop it in my mailbox in the physics office in Gallalee (2nd floor)
• drop it outside my office in Bevill (rm 228, folder on door)
• slide it under my Gallalee office door (1st floor)
  
• bring it to lecture tomorrow
• scan & email it

Labs for Wed and Thurs / this week's schedule

Tuesday: a bit more on magnetism, and some last-minute hints on HW2. HW3 will be out ... and you will get your exams back.

Wednesday: equipotential lines, somewhat out of sequence.

Thursday: mutual inductance.

At the last minute, I am going to have to be out of town on Wednesday and Thursday. Prof. Mankey will be giving the lectures on those two days. He will be covering new material, and will cover exactly what I had planned to go over. I will be in sporadic email contact while I am gone, and will be back in town on Friday.

Prof. Mankey has been doing this longer than I have, and knows what he is doing. Don't mistake my absence for a reason to miss class.

Your quiz this Friday will cover dc circuits and the first part of magnetism - basically what we covered last week Thursday through what we will do tomorrow. It will again be 5 questions multiple choice.