Math 114 (subject to change)

We will spend about a week on each chapter of Common Sense Mathematics .


September 8, Tuesday....

Introductions. What this course isn't. Fermi problems (Chapter 1) - numbers in the news, estimations, orders of magnitude. Quick and dirty arithmetic.


September 10, Thursday....

Fermi problems. Questions about the first homework.


September 15, Tuesday...

Note: add/drop ends today.

Numbers come with units. We've seen that when looking at Fermi problems, now we pay more particular attention. (Chapter 2).


September 17, Thursday....

Units.


September 22, Tuesday....

In principle, studying percentages (Chapter 3) is just a review of material learned in elementary school. In practice, most students need work here. We introduce some new methods that should help.


September 24, Thursday....

Percentages. A little bit about inflation (Chapter 4).


September 29, Tuesday

Averages (Chapter 5). More than you learned in high school, and more interesting too.


October 1, Thursday.... Averages


October 6, Tuesday....

EXAM 1 covering all the material to date - in principle, Chapters 1, 2, 3 and 5, but possibly less if we haven't moved quite as fast as planned.


October 8, Thursday....

Chapter 6: Income Distribution. Introducing Excel! Median.


October 13, Tuesday....

Charts (in Excel).


October 15, Thursday....

Still in Chapter 6. Histograms, percentiles.


October 20, Tuesday....

Electricity bills. Linear functions. (Chapter 7)


October 22, Thursday....

Linear functions.


October 27, Tuesday....

Regression (Chapter 8).


October 29, Thursday. ...
November 3, Tuesday....

EXAM 2


November 5, Thursday....

Exponential growth (Chapter 9)


November 10, Tuesday....
November 12, Thursday....


November 17, Tuesday


November 19, Thursday....

Credit cards and mortgages (Chapter 10)


November 24 Tuesday.... next day is Pass/Fail, Course Withdrawal deadline.

Probability - Chapter 11. The house advantage in several contexts: lotteries, roulette, insurance.


November 26, Thursday....

Thanksgiving


December 1, Tuesday.....

Chapter 12: Events that happen rarely - instincts often fail!


December 3, Thursday....

False positives (Chapter 13). This is really cool surprising stuff that makes a good finish.


December 8, Tuesday....
December 10, Thursday....

Last class

Write the final exam.


Tuesday, December 22
Final Exam
11:30-2:30
Healey Library Gold Lab (H-UL-41)
Term paper due.