Schedule

The first day of class (October 5 Tuesday), I'll discuss the administrative aspects of the course and give a brief introduction to the basic ideas of algebra. If you miss this day, then you shouldn't suffer too much for it, but you'll want to get the administrative information from me. The next day (October 7 Thursday), the class will begin in earnest.

The material for the first full week is to review arithmetic that you should already understand; this is mostly Sections 1.3–1.5 and 1.7 of the textbook (although some of it is hidden away in Sections 5.4 and 5.6). Note that Section 1.2 is not on the syllabus, although you should already know that material too. Next, I'll discuss arithmetic identities, which is mostly in Section 1.6 (although some of it is in Sections 5.2 and 5.4); I'll apply these to the rules of arithmetic in Sections 1.4&1.5, 1.7, and 5.4. Then I'll build on these to introduce algebraic expressions; these are covered in Section 1.8 of the textbook, and most of Chapter 5 is also about that (but I'll skip Section 5.5 for now). I'll also discuss some material from Section 2.4 involving evaluation of expressions and some material from Sections 2.5 and 3.1&3.2 that relates to linear expressions.

After that, we'll learn to solve and apply linear equations, which is most of what Chapter 2 (except for Sections 2.4 and 2.8) is about. We'll also cover linear inequalities (Sections 2.8 and 8.6) and some absolute-value equations and inequalities (Section 8.7). Next, I'll talk about equations in more than one variable, which is covered in Section 2.4 and most of Chapter 3 (except for Section 3.7); we'll approach most of this through graphing, and we'll also graph linear inequalities in two variables (Section 3.7). Finally, we'll discuss systems of linear equations, which is the topic of Chapter 4 (except for Section 4.6, which we won't cover). If there's time, we'll also do Section 5.5, which can serve as a sort of preparation for Intermediate Algebra.

In total, we'll cover Chapters 1–5 from the textbook (except skipping Sections 1.2 and 4.6), as well as Sections 8.6&8.7. It's a lot of material for 10 weeks, so the class has to move pretty fast; please talk to me early if you need help!

Here is a more detailed list of topics and sections from the textbook. The size of this list will not match our time in the course; where I follow the book's order more closely, the list is more condensed.

The last day to drop the course with a full refund is October 12 Tuesday; the last day to drop at all is November 29 Monday. On November 8 Monday, I will turn in midterm grades to the college; this is why the midterm exam is one class day earlier, on November 4 Thursday. By November 9 Tuesday, these should be available on WebAdvisor (and mailed to you if they're poor); your final grades should be available on December 21 Tuesday.


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This web page was written between 2003 and 2010 by Toby Bartels, last edited on 2010 December 16. Toby reserves no legal rights to it.

The permanent URI of this web page is http://tobybartels.name/MATH-0950/2010FA/schedule/.

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