University of Massachusetts, Amherst
Math 300 (Section 2)
Fundamental Concepts of Mathematics
Fall 2005

Click here to go the Homework Page
Click here to go the list of TA sessions


Course News: These will occasionally be posted to the course web site.



Farshid will offer a review session at 6 pm TONIGHT, Thursday Dec. 15, in 1322.

Here is the Sample Final Exam as well as Solutions to Sample Final Exam. I suggest you work on the problems first before consulting the solutions.

Here are HW 6 Solutions and HW 7 Solutions (available sometime after 2pm Dec 15).

Exam 2 has been moved to Thursday DEC 1 in class. Here is Sample Exam 2. Exam 2 will cover the problems and readings from HW 4,5. Here are solutions to some problems from HW 4 and HW 5: HW 4 Solutions, HW 5 Solutions.

HW6 will be due on Tues Dec 6.

Here is Sample Exam 1. Exam 1 covered the problems and readings from HW 1,2,3.

All three TA Sessions (M 10:10-11:00, Tu 8:30-9:20, and Tu 10:10-11:00) meet in 1322 LGRT.

All M300 students should sign up for the Math 300 co-seminar M391A, a one-credit course. This is because you will be meeting with a TA once a week for an hour in a small seminar session to discuss the course material and work on problems.


The final exam date/place will be announced later.

Meeting times: Tuesdays and Thursdays, 11:15-12:30, in Lederle 123. Additionally, during the first week of class, students will be assigned to a one-hour per week TA session. You should make every attempt to attend your own TA session, but if for some reason, you miss your TA session one day, you should feel free to attend another one that fits into your schedule.

Instructor: Dr. Farshid Hajir
Office: Lederle 1118
Phone: 545-6015
Email: hajir@math.umass.edu
Office Hours: Current office hours are W 9-10 and Thursday 1:30-2:30. You are always welcome to set up an appointment to see me by e-mail or phone.


Teaching Assistant and Seminar Leader: Laura Beltis
E-mail: lbeltis@student.umass.edu,
Office Hours: Office hours to be determined.

Texts: 1) Gilbert and Vanstone: An Introduction to Mathematical Thinking, Prentice Hall, 2005.
2) I have posted FARSHID'S COURSE NOTES to mywebsite.

Quizzes: Quizzes may be given by the TA during discussion sections or by Farshid during lecture; they will probably not be announced ahead of time. They will consist of one or two very simple questions. Absolutely no make-up quizzes will be given. Your lowest quiz grade will be dropped when computing your quiz average score.

WebCT Bulletin Board: A virtual M300 discussion room will be setup on your webct account. You can use this space to post messages related to the course, such as "A group of us are meeting at 9 tonight in the Science Library to discuss HW 2" or "Does anybody have a clue what the devil Farshid is asking for in Problem 5 of this week's hw?" If you get help with assignments from this bulletin board, do not forget to acknowledge it on your hw (check the hw rules carefully). Please use this service responsibly. I will monitor it regularly, but if you want to direct a question specifically at me, the best way to reach me is by e-mail.

Philosophical Remarks: They became so numerous, they lobbied successfully for their own page.

Homework: Homework will be posted on The Homework Page and collected every Thursday at the beginning of lecture. Late homework will not be accepted and the lowest homework grade will be dropped. Be sure to read and follow the homework rules.

Attendance: Attendance is required both during lectures and at the discussion sections. The instructors of the course consider attendance AND participation important ingredients for your success in the course. Frequent absences will be reflected in your grade.

Extra Credit: Some extra credit problems will be included in the homework assignments, or given during class.  The number of points for each problem will vary, as will the difficulty of the problem. The student with the most points at the end of the semester wins a fabulous prize. You may hand in Extra Credit solutions at any time throughout the term, until 12/6/05.

Grading:
   homework, quizzes, participation - 30%
   2 midterms - 20% each
   Final exam - 30%

Grading Scales

A

>= 93%

A-

>= 90%

B+

>= 86% and < 90%

B

>= 82% and < 86%

B-

>= 78% and < 82%

C+

>=74% and < 78%

C

>= 70% and < 74%

C-

>=65% and <70%

D

>=60% and < 65%

F

below 60%
Tentative Class Schedule:

The approximate schedule of topics and readings is as follows.

Note: Readings in Gilbert-Vanstone are in (). Readings from Farshid's notes are in []. Thus, (1.2--1.6) refers to sections 1.1 through 1.6 of Gilbert-Vanstone and [II] refers to Chapter 2 of Farshid's notes.

  • Week 1, 9/8: Problem Solving, Intro to proofs (1.1) [I]
  • Week 2, 9/13,15: Reasoning methods, basic logic, sets (1.2--1.6) [II]
  • Week 3, 9/20,22: Functions, injection, surjection, bijection, inverse (6.1--6.5) [III]
  • Week 4, 9/27,29: Finite sets (6.6) [IV]
  • Week 5, 10/4,6: Equivalence relations, partitions (3.3) [V]
  • Week 6, 10/11,13: Review, MIDTERM 1 (10/13)
  • Week 7, 10/18,20: Counting Principles [VI]
  • Week 8, 10/25,27: Mathematical Induction (4.1--4.3) [VI]
  • Week 9, 11/1,3: Elementary number theory, divisibility (2.1--2.5) [VII]
  • Week 10, 11/8,10: Congruences (3.1-3.6) [VII]
  • Week 11, 11/15,17: Review, MIDTERM 2 (11/17)
  • Week 12, 11/22: The set of real numbers, countability (5.1--5.4) [VIII]
  • Week 13, 11/29,12/1: Uncountable sets, Cantor's theorem (6.6) [VIII]
  • Week 14, 12/6,8: Complex Numbers (8.1--8.4) [IX]
  • Week 15, 12/13: Complex Numbers (8.5--8.8) [IX]