Foreword
My only goal in teaching is to make what I teach incredibly easy to follow in an attractive and friendly way. If I fail to do that, that means I am a terrible TA. I don’t want to be a terrible TA, so I promise I am trying my best to do that. Here are some specific thoughts I have on how to become a great TA, which I’m striving to achieve.
Update (12/18/2023): Based on the Math Department’s ‘Tentative TA Assignments for Spring 2024,’ I am scheduled to be a TA for Math 225 with discussion times on Tuesdays and Thursdays at 10 and 11 am. As of now, I don’t have information about the specific section I will be assigned to. I will update this teaching page as soon as I receive further details. Additionally, please note that the Math Department has advised that some assignments, particularly for lower-division courses, may change in January. Final confirmations of assignments and professors will be made after the math office reopens on January 3rd.
Math 226: Calculus III (12:00pm-12:50pm, 39568 R)
— Prof. Nathaniel Emerson
Professor Emerson’s Course Homepage
Ivan’s office hours in the final week: 4-6 pm on Monday (Dec 4) and 11 am-12 pm on Tuesday (Dec 5) in the Math Center (KAP 263).
Page overview: I’ve provided all the information you might need about our discussions on this page, aiming to save you the time of asking questions I should have made clear to you. But that doesn’t mean you can’t ask me things that can be found on that page — you are still very welcome to ask me if there’s too much to go through here. But here’s a trick you might like. Copy all words from this page into ChatGPT (OpenAI’s conversational AI model designed for human-like text interactions), and then pose your question. The AI system will use the information I’ve provided on this page to answer.
Discussion Recordings:
Discussion notes*: I’ll upload the handout solutions to this Google Drive folder by 4:30 pm on every Tuesday and Thursday after our discussion sessions.
*Copyright claim: all handout problems there are prepared by Professor Emerson, and all solutions and notes there are written by me.
Calculus II discussion notes for review*: Click here for Calc II review materials. Keep in mind, however, that reviewing Calc II isn’t essential for mastering Calc III, as our Calc III course doesn’t heavily rely on Calc II content.
*Copyright claim: all handout problems there are prepared by Professor Emerson, and all solutions and notes there are written by me.
Discussion plan:
I’d like to tell you which exercises I plan to discuss on the board the day before each discussion (e.g., Monday and Wednesday nights). In this way, you can have a bit more control over the discussion in your preview (if you want) and maybe focus more on the other problems. Here’s the link to our corresponding Google sheets. For your convenience, I’ve also embedded the sheet below. While the embedded version is view-only, you can make edits using the provided link.
Please let me know any other problems you want me to cover in the last column of the sheet. And if you have anything to include, please do that before 12:30 pm on the discussion day, so I can have time to prepare in advance in order to avoid any mistakes I might make and find the best way to teach them.
Email responding: Whenever you have any math questions or comments, email me anytime at ifeng@usc.edu. Every day from 8:30 to 9:00 pm (including weekends), I make sure to sit in front of my computer to reply to all emails regarding this course. If you send me an email during this time, you can expect me to see it immediately and respond very soon. If you email me before 8:30 pm, say at 10 am that day, I might not check my mailbox right away, but I’ll definitely see it by 8:30 pm at the latest; again, you can expect a response from me during the 8:30-9:00 pm time period (but it can be much sooner).
Syllabus quiz rule and make-ups: In our discussion, there’s a quiz lasting 10 minutes long on every Thursday, starting from the second week (8/31). We have 2 versions of every quiz, one for each discussion. We should not use calculators or notes during quizzes. According to Prof. Emerson, any student can freely* make up 2 quizzes per semester, and all quiz makeups must be done in person. After 2 make-ups, you should contact Prof. Emerson if you want more chances. So if you have to make them up, you can come to the Math Center during any of my office hours and you’ll have access to a separate quiet room to complete it. Please note that any makeup for a quiz must be completed between that quiz and the subsequent one. For example, if you need to make up Quiz 3, then you have to do it before Quiz 4 takes place.
*Note: If a student has already taken the quiz, they are not eligible for a make-up. The make-up option is only available to students who missed the quiz but still want to earn a score for it. In other words, students obviously cannot know the quiz problems beforehand.
Quiz grading: Prof. Emerson creates the grading rubrics for all quizzes this semester, while I am responsible for grading the quizzes by his rubrics. I usually finish grading and publish scores on Gradescope by Saturday night*. In case I made a blunder in grading, please don’t hesitate to submit a regrading request in Gradescope (or directly email me) so I can fix your scores.
*Note: Emerson occasionally doesn’t release the grading rubrics on Gradescope until the following week (after Saturday night). In such cases, I won’t be able to complete the grading by Saturday night, as is the case with Quiz 3. However, I will finish grading as soon as the rubrics are published.
Discussion attendance: Attendance for discussion sections is not mandatory, so you don’t need to notify Prof. Emerson or me if you choose not to attend. However, if you miss a discussion on a Thursday when there’s a quiz, please consider scheduling a make-up with me to ensure it doesn’t affect your course grade. Then again, I really encourage you to attend, because, without you, our discussion is not complete.
Discussion recording: For our Tue/Thu discussions, the Blackboard Zoom recurring meeting links were set up by Emerson purely as a precaution. They’re there in case I’m unable to lead discussions in person due to illness or unforeseen circumstances. Additionally, Prof. Emerson has recommended that I not use my own device for these sessions. Therefore, we will not use these Zoom links as long as we’re meeting face-to-face. However, if you can’t attend a discussion in person but still want to hear me go over the problems, please let me know in advance. I can then record the session using my personal Zoom room and share it with you later. This way, you won’t miss out on any content.
Asking questions: In our discussions, no silly question exists, meaning I genuinely won’t consider any question to be silly. Remember, Isaac Newton asked himself a super silly and childish question in the summer of 1666: Why would an apple fall down instead of falling upwards or sideways? But that childish question finally led him to the discovery of universal gravitation. Thus, you are always welcome to ask everything in your mind, no matter whether the answer can be found on the board or in previous lecture notes. And I’d be very happy to answer anything you ask. Of course, if you prefer not asking questions in public, you’re welcome to speak with me privately after our discussions or during my office hours. Or if you prefer to work independently and rely on yourself, it’s also great. There’s no single way to find answers to your questions. But, I’m asking you to preserve your curiosity well and never let it go.
Discussion time and location:
2:00—2:50 pm on Tue, Thu (39569 R)
3:00—3:50 pm on Tue, Thu (39570 R)
Both in KAP 140
Office hours:
4-5 pm on Monday, 5-6 pm on Thursday, 4-5 pm on Friday, and by appointment*
*You are always welcome to attend my office hours. This is my designated time to assist students, so please don’t feel hesitant—it’s what I’m here for. I’ll be waiting for you in the math center. If my hours don’t fit your schedule, feel free to schedule an appointment with me outside of my regular office hours. We can either do it in the Math Center physically or in my personal zoom room online. Send me an email so we can set up a time, and then I’ll send you my zoom link. You can find my weekly schedule here to check my availability.
Office-hour locations:
Math Center [KAP 263] and Zoom
If you want to join my office hours by Zoom, click here. The Math Center Assistant on duty will assign you to my breakout room.
Note I: As a rule of the Math Center, TAs are there for *all* students (not just their own students) when holding office hours. So you can go there anytime to do homework or get help from any TAs. And I will surely be there at least during my office hours. You can check out here the Math Center Schedules including all TAs’ office hours this semester.
Note II: The Math Center is run on a drop-in basis without appointments. Thus, if many students show up during my office hours, I’ll try to let you ask one question at a time in order of arrival (unless you have to leave soon) and then continue the cycle, to ensure everyone there has a chance to discuss questions with me instead of waiting for nothing. Feel free to give me any feedback!
How to address me: Ivan. There’s no need to call me ‘Mr. Feng’ or ‘Professor Feng’. Of course, I’d never correct how you address me, as I respect your right to call me whatever you want, but, as a personal preference, ‘Ivan’ is what I’d prefer to hear from anyone.
Textbook: Essential Calculus (2nd Edition) by Stewart (Click here for the PDF file)
Additional course resources:
All past final exams from 2001 to 2020: https://dornsife.usc.edu/mathcenter/226/
Afterword
In our lives, we’ve got a lot of things to do. But during this period, in addition to our math studies, we’ve chosen to serve as TAs. So we should focus on this thing seriously, and do it really well.
— Ivan Zhanhu Feng