Dr. Jonathan Mohr's

Expectations Regarding Attendance and Course Work

("The Rules")

1. Students are expected to attend every class and lab session.

   • However, each student will be allowed up to two unexcused absences over the term of the course.
   • A student may be granted one or more excused absences due to serious illness or family affliction; in particular, any student who has a communicable disease (other than the common cold and similar ubiquitous afflictions) is requested to stay away from the class.
   • Any student having more than two unexcused absences from class and/or lab sessions may be suspended from the course.
   
   
   

2. Students are expected to have read the assigned portions of the textbook and completed any assigned exercises prior to attending the class session in which they will be discussed.

   • Students will be expected to answer questions in class regarding the assigned readings and exercises.
   • Any student who has not completed the assigned reading and/or exercises may be asked to leave the class session at which they are being discussed (but see Rule 1).
   
   
   

3. Students are expected to complete all assigned exercises, lab activities, and programming assignments by the stated due date and time.

   • In spite of this expectation, as a concession to human nature, late assignments will be accepted, but will be subject to a progressive penalty of 1% per hour. This effectively gives you up to four days to submit a late assignment for partial marks.
   • Most assignments will be submitted via a web-based submission program. The program allows students to submit numerous versions of their assignments prior to the due date so that there is no excuse for not having submitted at least a preliminary version of an assignment. (Sample non-excuses: "My computer crashed." "The network was down." "The printer was out of paper." "My dog ate my paper." "My car ran out of gas on the way to the computer lab.") Only the last version submitted will be graded.
   • Any student who fails to submit more than one assignment may be suspended from the course.
   
   
   

4. Students are expected to engage in active learning in this course. Some suggestions for active learning activities are:

   • Mark up your textbook while reading it. If a paragraph includes the definition of a term, write the name of the term in the margin. If the paragraph includes an important idea or an idea which is new to you, underline the relevant phrase, or put a star in the margin next to the paragraph. If you are a visual learner, draw pictures in the textbook which will remind you of the content of the text.
   • Read the questions at the end of each section or chapter and try to answer most or all of them. If you don't know the answer to a question, re-read the relevant sections of the chapter.
   • Take notes in class, even if you never look at them later. Taking notes forces your brain to process what you are hearing, minimally by just writing it out again, or maximally by identifying the important concepts in what is being said/heard or classifying ideas in a hierarchy.
   • Keep a journal for the course. Record new insights, related ideas, questions on which you need to do more research. In particular, keep track of what changes you make in the programs you write, what types of errors you are most likely to make, and what the solutions were to the error messages or bugs that had you mystified.
   • Refer to materials other than the required textbook. Read related sections in the books on reserve in the library. Study material found on relevant Web pages, such as those in the "Resources" section of the course materials index, or referenced on the textbook home page.
   • Think critically about information you are given. If a fellow student suggests a solution to a bug that you can't seem to solve, ask yourself why the solution should work. If the textbook says something that doesn't make sense to you, raise a question about the material in class or in private with the instructor, or refer to other sources for confirmation or contradiction.
   • Explain the course material to someone else. Find a study partner, and take turns explaining concepts to each other. Reformulate definitions in your own words. Ask your study partner to explain the similarities and differences between closely related concepts.
   • Personalize the material. Try to imagine how you will make use of the new things you are learning in the future, or reflect on how it would have helped you solve a problem in the past. Evaluate how you are developing as a learner or thinker through grappling with the material of the course.

For a less polite but more accurate reading of these rules, please substitute the word "required" for the word "expected" in all of the rules listed above.

Links

Jonathan Mohr's home page

Dr. Mohr's current courses