I have just completed TMA03 on the linear algebra section of the course and I am just in the process of writing up the last question so that I can post it off in the next day or two. I worked on questions 5 and 6 on the train whilst travelling down to see my family in Norfolk. I always book the quiet coach but it isn't always that quiet. I am sometimes confused as to why parents with young children book this coach when they must know that their children are hardly going to be able to keep quiet!
I have enjoyed linear algebra. I wish that they had included another block of it in the course as they have done for group theory and analysis. As such, this was the first time in a few months that I have delved back into it and I seem to be able to manage the questions ok.
The first three questions were straight forward but the latter three required much more thought and were a nice challenge. One in particular on subspaces and dimensions really made me think about the material and I felt that it pushed the boundaries a bit more than some of the other questions. The question on quadrics was just a slog and it is one of those where a simple slip can mess up the whole answer.
I wonder how many students do this, but part of my process for answering the questions is to look for self-consistency in my answers. For example, if I diagonalise a symmetric matrix A, I make sure that PTAP really does lead to a diagonal matrix! It is a good way of making sure that my answers are likely to be correct.
Now that I have done a good chunk of the TMA's and I have had a bit of a break, I feel ready to go back to the books and start reading again. First off finish the last section of GTB3 on the counting theorem!
Thursday, 23 February 2012
Monday, 13 February 2012
TMA addiction
I am currently making good progress with the TMA's because I can't stop doing the questions. I keep thinking that I'll put the question paper away for a bit and get on with some more reading but I can't help having a little look at the next unanswered question. I tinker around with it and before I know it I am fleshing out the whole answer. So TMA02 is done and I will post it off today and I have already completed a couple of questions from TMA03.
I had the first part of TMA01 back today and I was pleased to get 35/35 but I am slightly worried that I might have messed up something in the equivalence relation question in part 2. I have been learning a bit more about equivalence relations from the discussions on the forum and there was some discussion about whether you needed to have the reflexive condition or not. I tried to think of examples where a relation is symmetric and transitive, but not reflexive, but I found it hard to do. The trick, apparently, is to have an element of a set that is not related to any other element, including itself. I think equivalence relations are whole topic in itself and I could spend hours getting bogged down in it (which I don't intend to do!).
I had the first part of TMA01 back today and I was pleased to get 35/35 but I am slightly worried that I might have messed up something in the equivalence relation question in part 2. I have been learning a bit more about equivalence relations from the discussions on the forum and there was some discussion about whether you needed to have the reflexive condition or not. I tried to think of examples where a relation is symmetric and transitive, but not reflexive, but I found it hard to do. The trick, apparently, is to have an element of a set that is not related to any other element, including itself. I think equivalence relations are whole topic in itself and I could spend hours getting bogged down in it (which I don't intend to do!).
Thursday, 9 February 2012
Sense of humour failure
I have had a slight sense of humour failure over M208 over the last week but I think I am past it now. Instead of working on the books at the end of the course I have been working through the TMAs and I have completed TMA01 and I have nearly finished TMA02.
The sense of humour failure occurred because I was getting frustrated with the language of the questions. The OU marks are very formalised and you have to tick all the boxes to get all of the marks but often it is a guessing game to decide how much to put in and how much to leave out of an answer. I want to be concise but on the other hand I don't want to miss marks for not showing enough working or not supporting an argument. It was doing my head in a bit.
In the end I have decided to say "stuff it"; I am going to answer the questions in a way which I think is best and most natural to me and I don't care if I don't tick all the boxes. Enough of this agonising!
Actually, I think the TMAs are very straight forward (unless I am missing something). I suppose that's because I have already worked to near the end of the course and I have a lot of familiarity with it, so some of the early stuff seems a doddle. Perhaps I am going to be in for a shock when I get my first TMA back! TMAs are also addictive. I like solving the puzzles and I will probably end up doing most of them before I knuckle down to the last four books of the course (I have just one more section in GTB3 to finish before I get onto the last four analysis books).
The sense of humour failure occurred because I was getting frustrated with the language of the questions. The OU marks are very formalised and you have to tick all the boxes to get all of the marks but often it is a guessing game to decide how much to put in and how much to leave out of an answer. I want to be concise but on the other hand I don't want to miss marks for not showing enough working or not supporting an argument. It was doing my head in a bit.
In the end I have decided to say "stuff it"; I am going to answer the questions in a way which I think is best and most natural to me and I don't care if I don't tick all the boxes. Enough of this agonising!
Actually, I think the TMAs are very straight forward (unless I am missing something). I suppose that's because I have already worked to near the end of the course and I have a lot of familiarity with it, so some of the early stuff seems a doddle. Perhaps I am going to be in for a shock when I get my first TMA back! TMAs are also addictive. I like solving the puzzles and I will probably end up doing most of them before I knuckle down to the last four books of the course (I have just one more section in GTB3 to finish before I get onto the last four analysis books).
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