Module Review: MA1513 (AY17/18 Semester 2)

MA1513 Linear Algebra with Differential Equations is a 2 MC module that took place from Week 1 - 8. Lectures were from weeks 1 - 7 and tutorials were from weeks 2 - 6. I would say this module had the best lecturer and tutor, out of the modules that I took this semester.  

Assessment
15% In-Class Assignment 
10% Lecture Quiz
5% IVLE Quiz
70% Finals (Closed Book, with 2 page cheat sheet)

Lecturer: A/Prof Victor Tan
Tutor: Marciuk, Adriana Ewa

Lectures
Lectures were 1 hour long which took place once a week. There were seven of them in total. However, there are web lectures in IVLE to listen to before attending the lecture. Each week, there were about 4-5 videos (of about 10 minutes long each) to watch. So, there are technically two types of lecture slides: one for the online videos and one for the physical lecture. During the physical lecture, since it is only 1 hour long, the lecturer would usually just summarise the key points of the topic. I find the summary slides to be super useful because I can just copy his summary into my cheat sheet for the final exam. The lecturer was also able to explain all the concepts clearly and I really liked how his slides were very organised (as compared to the other modules I took in the semester). I mean there were pretty new concepts for JC students like us to learn such as eigenvectors and linear independence. But I was able to understand them pretty quickly due to his clear explanations.

At the end of every lecture, we are required to answer 2 lecture quiz questions where the marks are only awarded for participation. This meant that so long as you submitted your answer, you'll get the mark regardless of whether it is right or wrong.

Tutorial
Tutorials were held once a week and were 2 hours long. The tutor would usually give a brief summary of the topic, followed by going through the tutorial questions that were prepared for that week and then giving us time to do the in-class assignment. My tutor was pretty okay, I guess. I mean she can explain things well but I wouldn't say she's really good. But I ain't complaining (cos she's much better than the other tutors for the other modules I took in the semester). For the in-class assignment, just like MA1511, we could discuss with our friends and we could refer to our notes too. It serves as a good revision of the concepts learnt in lecture in the previous week. We would submit the assignments, our tutor would mark it and return it back to us the following week. 

For the IVLE quiz, there were 5 quizzes in total. We given one week to do it and each quiz has about 5-6 MCQ questions. We were also given multiple attempts for each quiz so it ain't really a problem.  

Final Exam
The finals for this module took place on a Sunday on week 8 (just like MA1511 last semester). The paper was 1.5 hours long and consisted of 6 questions in total. This meant that we only had 15 minutes for each question. Bear in mind that each question has 2 parts as well, meaning that there are actually 12 questions in total. Thus, time management was really important. I somehow managed to finish the paper right on time and yeah, I would say it wasn't a very terrible paper. There were tricky components but it wasn't like an impossible paper like MA1511.

You can view my 2 page cheat sheet here.

Expected Grade: A
Final Grade: A+

Final Comments
I feel like I could do very well for this module because the lecturer was really good in explaining all the foreign concepts to us. I would say the concepts were not easy to grasp but once I could understand the reasoning behind certain things in the module, the questions were not that tough anymore (as compared to MA1511).

Stay tuned for more updates.

- Alan

No comments:

Post a Comment

Module Review: CN5111 (AY19/20 Semester 2)

CN5111 Optimisation of Chemical Processes is a 4 MC Technical Elective (TE) non-pathway module which teaches optimisation programmes that ...