MATHEMATICS 103
Quantitative Methods
Grading |
Course Schedule |
Course policies |
Description: Mathematics 103 prepares students to be quantitatively literate citizens in today's world. By learning to think critically about quantitative issues, students will be able to make responsible decisions in their daily lives. Problems are analyzed and solved using numerical, graphical, statistical, and algebraic reasoning. Technology is used to help visualize data and facilitate calculations, as well as to present quantitative output and verbal arguments.
Class Times: MWF 9:00am - 9:55am, Th 8:00am
Location: P-107, Brumbaugh Academic Center
Instructor: Dr. Gerald Kruse
Phone: 641-3595
Office: C-205A, Brumbaugh Academic
Center
E-mail: kruse@juniata.edu
Office Hours: For the most up-to-date, see http://faculty.juniata.edu/kruse/office.htm
Textbook: Quantitative Reasoning, by Sevilla and Somers, ISBN: 1-931914-90-7
Grading (tentative schedule):
Exam 01 - Monday, September 14
100 points
Exam 02 - Monday, October 05
100 points
Exam 03 - Friday, November 06
100 points
Exam 04 - Friday, December 04
100 points
There is NO Final Exam in this course
Activities turned-in
10 points
per graded Activity
Projects
30 points per graded Project
Class Attendance, Participation, and Professionalism 25 points
Course Policies: For the most up-to-date, see http://faculty.juniata.edu/kruse/policies.htm
Partnerships: Teams of two are allowed (but not required) on Exams, Activities and Projects. Teams will be required on certain Activities as noted, but not all. Teamwork should be shared – and team membership is voluntary. Teams can be created and dissolved at will. If your partner is not contributing his/her fair share, you should feel free to form a new partnership or work on your own. If you hand in an assignment as a team of two, you are indicating that you worked together on every single problem. “You do the first two problems, I’ll do the last three,” or, even worse, “You do this week’s assignment and I’ll do next week’s” does not constitute acceptable collaboration and is an academic integrity violation.
Exams: Exams will be open book and open notebook. You may use your scientific calculator, and you may log-in to the computer at your desk and use a blank Excel spreadsheet or the calculator. You should not expect to encounter exam problems designed to require Excel, since the in-class exams will be designed to test conceptual understanding, not computational aptitude. During an exam you will not be allowed to use any other application, such as: email, a web-browser, instant-messaging, cell-phones, text-messaging, etc. There is a "Zero-Tolerance" policy for violation of this policy. That is if you use any of these applications during an exam, you will receive 0 points.
Laptops to class: This course relies heavily on active learning, especially with the computer-based Activities. Since the class room has fewer computers than students, several students will need to bring their laptop to class. Laptops are available for checkout from the Juniata College help desk.
Graded Assignments: Typically students will begin one of the Activities from the text in each class session. While the entire Activity will be checked for completeness, a question or two randomly selected after the Activities are collected will be graded in detail. Over the course of the semester, between two and five Projects will also be assigned. The Projects are more in-depth and open-ended than the Activities (as well as worth more points), and are an opportunity for the student to apply the concepts previously covered. All Activities and Projects should be turned in for grading in the format specified.
Assignments accepted via Moodle are configured with the "upload and review" format, so students have the responsibility to double-check the file that they upload. If there is a problem, they can still upload the correct version. There will not be any opportunity to send the "correct version" of the file after the assignment is due.
Usually all the assigned Activities are due at the beginning of class. It is the student's responsibility to be aware of, and plan for, the assignment deadline. Late assignments, if they are accepted by the instructor, will be penalized 10% per day.
Supplemental Homework Problems: Students should read the upcoming Topic prior to class, and attempt the suggested Exploration problems in the course schedule below. There will be time at the beginning of each class session for questions on Exploration problems. Completing these problems should help students prepare for the exams, and, in fact, these problems sometimes make great exam questions themselves!
Weekly Discussion Section ("4th hour") : The weekly discussion section is designed to be a help session, where no new topics will be introduced. This hour is set aside for help on homework problems and/or computer assistance. Attendance at the weekly discussion section is required if you currently have earned less than 80% of the total points OR you have requested a tutor in the course; otherwise, attendance at the weekly discussion section is optional. Failure to attend when required will be reflected in the participation grade. Students using Moodle to check their course average should remember to subtract off the ungraded points from the total points available.
Athletics and Extra-curricular activities: Students whose attendance might be affected by participation in extra-curricular activities should contact the instructor with their schedule (if available) during the first week of the semester.
Accomodations: If a student has an accomodation, the student is responsible for initiating the process to set up the accomodation. For example, if a student has an accomodation allowing them extra time to complete an exam, the student must approach the instructor to make arrangements for a time and place to take the exam.
Course Outline: Read sections of the text
prior to class, since much of the mathematical content is "review"
and class time may be more directed toward alternative methods and computer
implementation.
Study
Guides and Strategies General
Course Guidelines
Notes and outlines as linked below are based on
material from the text by Sevilla and Somers, which is copyrighted. Use of this
material beyond the context of this course may infringe on the copyright of
those texts.
| Day | Topic | In-class Work | Out-of-class Work |
| M-08/24 | Course Introduction Discuss General Course Guidelines |
Data Survey Personal Survey (here are Prof. Kruse's responses if you are interested) |
Attitudes Assessment |
| W-08/26 | Assessment Day I | ||
| Th-08/27 | Getting to know each other... Topic 1: Charts
and Graphs |
Assignment 01 Due: beginning of class on Mon, 08/31 |
Topic 1 Explorations: 1, 2, 3, 5 |
| Fr-08/28 | Topic 1: Pie Charts click and scroll down for the worst Pie Chart "ever" |
continue Assignment 01 Due: beginning of class on Mon, 08/31 |
Topic 1 Explorations: 8, 10, 11 |
| M-08/31 | Assignment 01 due |
Assignment 02
Due: beginning of class on Fri, 09/04 |
Topic 1 Explorations: 6 |
| W-09/02 | Topic 2: Bivariate Data and Scatterplots | continue
Assignment 02
Due: beginning of class on Fri, 09/04 |
Topic 2 Explorations: 1, 2 |
| Th-09/03 | Starting today, this 4th hour is optional if you have 80% or more of the
available points (check your points in Moodle). However, if you haven't completed Assignment 02, it probably makes sense for you to attend and complete it. |
||
| Fr-09/04 | Assignment 02 due Topic 2: Functions and Relations |
Assignment 03
Due: END of class on Fri, 09/11 |
Topic 2 Explorations: 3, 6, 7 |
| M-09/07 | Topic 3: Graphs of Functions | continue
Assignment 03
Due: END of class on Fri, 09/11 |
Topic 3 Explorations: 2, 3, 5, 8 |
| W-09/09 | Topic 4: Multiple
Variable Functions |
continue
Assignment 03
Due: END of class on Fri, 09/11 |
Topic 4 Explorations: 1, 4, 5 |
| Fr-09/11 | Assignment 03 due Review Day / Work Problems |
||
| M-09/14 | Exam 01 | Fall 2009 Exam 01 Fall 2009 Exam 01 Key |
|
| W-09/16 | Project 01 Due: Mon, 10/05 | ||
| Fr-09/18 | Topic 5: Directly Proportional and Linear Functions |
Assignment 04
Due: beginning of class on Fri, 09/25 |
Topic 5 Explorations: 1, 2, 5 |
| M-09/21 | Topic 5: more Linear
Functions, Inversely Proportional Functions, and more Concavity |
continue
Assignment 04
Due: beginning of class on Fri, 09/25 |
Topic 5 Explorations: 6 |
| W-09/23 | Topic 6: Modeling w/Linear and Exponential Functions |
Assignment 05
Due: end of class on Fri, 10/02 |
Topic 6 Explorations: 5, 6, 8 |
| F-09/25 | Assignment 04 due Topic 6: Linear Regression |
continue
Assignment 05
Due: end of class on Fri, 10/02 |
Topic 6 Explorations: 2 (in Excel) |
| M-09/28 | Assignment 05 due Topic 7: Logarithmic
Scale |
continue
Assignment 05
Due: end of class on Fri, 10/02 |
Topic 7 Explorations: 1, 2, 3, 5 |
| W-09/30 | Review Day / Work Problems |
||
| Th-10/01 | No Class, Mountain Day! | ||
| Fr-10/02 | Assignment 05 due
Topic 7: Estimation |
Assignment 06
Due: END of class on Fri, 10/09 |
Topic 7 Explorations: 4, 6, 8, 10 |
| M-10/05 | Project 01 due Exam 02 |
Fall 2009 Exam 02 Fall 2009 Exam 02 Key |
|
| W-10/07 | Topic 8: Indexes
and Ratings CPI homepage |
continue
Assignment 06
Due: END of class on Fri, 10/09 |
Topic 8 Explorations: 3, 4, 10 |
| Fr-10/09 | Assignment 06 due Topic 9: Savings |
Compound Interest Worksheet | Topic 9 Explorations: 3, 4, 6 |
| M-10/12 | Topic 9: Loans |
Assignment 07
Due: end of class on Fri, 10/16 |
Topic 9 Explorations: 8, 9, 10 |
| W-10/14 | Topic 9: Loans | continue
Assignment 07
Due: end of class on Fri, 10/16 |
|
| Fr-10/16 | Assignment 07 due Topic 8: Fog Index |
Activity 8.1 no need to turn-in, although you will be responsible for this material |
Topic 8 Explorations: 6, 7, 8 |
| M-10/19 | No Class: |
||
| W-10/21 | Project 02 Due: Mon, 11/09 | Brief Intro to Web-site Evaluation Project 02 |
|
| Fr-10/23 | Topic 14: Apportionment, Quota Methods National
Atlas |
Assignment 08
Due: 10:00am on Fri, 10/30 |
Topic 14 Explorations: 1, 5 |
| M-10/26 | Topic 14: Apportionment, Divisor Methods National
Atlas |
continue
Assignment 08
Due: 10:00am on Fri, 10/30 |
Topic 14 Explorations: 2, 3 |
| W-10/28 | continue with Topic 14 |
||
| Fr-10/30 | No Class: |
||
| M-11/02 | Topic 16: Averages and Five-Number Summary |
Assignment 09
Due: end of class on Thurs, 11/05 |
Topic 16 Explorations: 1, 2, 6, 7, 9 |
| W-11/04 | Review Day / Work Problems |
||
| Th-11/05 | Assignment 09 due |
||
| Fr- 11/06 | Exam 03 | Fall 2009 Exam 03 Fall 2009 Exam 03 Key |
|
| M-11/09 | Project 02 due Topic 17: Standard
Deviation, z-score, and Normal Distributions |
Assignment 10
Due: beginning of class on Fri, 11/13 |
Topic 17 Explorations: 1, 2, 4, 7, 8, 9 |
| W-11/11 | Finish Topic 17: Standard
Deviation, z-score, and Normal Distributions |
Standard Deviation Worksheet | |
| Fr-11/13 | Assignment 10 due Topic 18: Basics of Probability |
Assignment 11
Due: beginning of class on Fri, 11/20 |
Topic 18 Explorations: 2, 3, 5, 6, 9, 10 |
| M-11/16 | Topic 19: Conditional Probability and Tables |
continue Assignment 11 Due: beginning of class on Fri, 11/20 |
Topic 19 Explorations: 3, 4, 5, 6, 7 |
| W-11/18 | Problem Day |
Probability Worksheet
Might hand-in |
|
| Fr-11/20 | Assignment 11 due Topic 20: Sampling and Surveys |
Assignment 12
Due: 5:00pm on Tues, 11/24 |
Topic 20 Explorations: 2, 5, 7, 8, 10 |
| M-11/23 | continue with Topic 20 | ||
| Tu-11/24 | Assignment 12 due | ||
| W-11/25 | No Class: Thanksgiving Break |
||
| Th-11/26 | No Class: Thanksgiving Break |
||
| Fr-11/27 | No Class: |
||
| M-11/30 | Project 03 Due: Tues, 12/08 |
||
| W-12/02 | Review Day / Work Problems | ||
| Fr-12/04 | Exam 04 | Spring 2009 Exam 04 Spring 2009 Exam 04 Key |
|
| M-12/07 | Assessment Day II | ||
| Tu-12/08 | Project 03 due | ||
| There is NO Final Exam in this course |
Important Note: There are many ways to get help with the technology
we use. Each of the Activities in your
textbook have detailed directions, and the Excel Commands by Activitiy
section provides the page containing the detail for each command. Additionally, the software we use has excellent
help features – take advantage! Finally,
you can always ask your professor when you need help.
The software we use is not hard to learn if you try, and we use it because it helps us understand the topic we are studying.
