CH 302 Random Musings, Spring 2005, Top of the First ...laude.cm.utexas.edu/courses/ch302/musings/rm012005.pdfCH 302 Random Musings, Spring 2005, Top of the First (January 20, 2005)

CH 302 Random Musings, Spring 2005, Top of the First (January 20, 2005)

1. For folks new to the class, this is the first of a collection of random musings that I put out each Thursday tokeep you abreast of what is going on in class. Specific questions about quizzes and exams, including contentand format, are provided in the musings as well as a bunch of stuff which is often drivel. You have to find thegood stuff. Remember, it is your responsibility to read the musings even if you cannot come to class (they willbe posted on the web.) I take a dim view of students asking me questions that I previously answered in thisforum.

2. First an example of drivel. Everybody has apreference about people, and for my money nothingbeats hanging out with children. I have made abunch of them including a few your age, but there isa new crop coming along.. Here are Sam, age 4,Maddie, age 2 and Nate-Dog, age 0, with their momdoing Christmas stuff.

3. Now something you would find useful.Knowing what questions are on a quiz or examhelps. Just because I know you are anxious to getstarted, here are the eight question types for the quizon Tuesday, February 1. By the way, I will alwaysprovide a list of question types for quizzes andexams about 10 days prior to testing.

• Thermodynamics foundation (system anduniverse, state functions, laws)

• Bomb calorimetry calculation• Hess’ Law calculation using ΔHf

o constantsfrom Appendix K.

• Hess’ Law calculation using bond energyvalues

• Work calculation from Δngas• A question about signs and energy flow• Identifying entropy increases and decreases• The temperature dependence of ΔG

.

4. Practice quizzes help. For those of you thinking, what have I gotten myself into with all these quizzes, thegood news is that each Thursday before a quiz I will work a practice quiz at the end of class that looksdecidedly like the quiz you will take the following Tuesday.

5. Working worksheets during review sessions. Remember how this course works, starting next week therewill be a worksheet posted that you can work on the material taught in class. If you come to a review session aworksheet will be provided to you. If you can’t come or want to start early, you can download a worksheetfrom the web site. For example, next week’s worksheet is on ΔH calculations and the following week theworksheet is a bunch of chemical to which you assign sign and calculate changes in state functions.

6. I don’t do homework problems with the HW Service. Many of you come from classes where homeworkproblems were made available and were worth extra credit. I don’t do that, Instead I ask you to work a varietyof different types of problems in preparation for the quizzes and exams. You can work problems in the back of

the text, you can work my old quizzes and exams which are exactly the same format as the new quizzes andexams, and you can work the worksheets I provide. Best of all, you can create your own problems to prove toyourself you know the material. But don’t just work problems mindlessly, ask yourself as you work problemswhether you can actually explain and recreate what you are doing—then prove it. Trying to memorize how todo a problem in CH302 as the calculations get harder is sheer folly.

7. We start the review sessions next week. Join one. They are listed below. Why not make a note in yourcalendar to make one part of your weekly schedule. Showing up weekly to learn how to do the worksheets withyour peers is a great use of an hour of chemistry study since the material on the worksheets is what is on thequizzes and tests and if you need help working the problems, there is someone around to help.

Review sessions*:day/time location usual presiderMonday, 3 to 4 pm WEL 2.312 David LaudeMonday, 4 to 5 pm Welch 1.308 Alexis LennartMonday, 5 to 6 pm Welch 1.308 Alexis LennartTuesday 4 to 5 p.m. Welch 2.312 Lauda MillspaughWednesday 1 to 2 p.m. WAG 420 David LaudeWednesday 4 to 5 p.m. BUR 112 Anna SmithWednesday 5 to 6 p.m. BUR 112 Anna SmithThursday 11 a.m. to noon ESB 223 David LaudeThursday, 5 to 6 p.m. GEO 2.202 Lauda Millspaugh

8. Peer-to-peer assistance in review sessions. I have found that the best review sessions are ones in which thestudents do all the work and the TAs and I walk around offering bits of advice here and there. What makesthem even better is when students receive assistance from each other in the process. I am looking to have aboutfive students per session become involved in serving as peer assistants as a variation on the preceptor program Iran last semester. This semester’s version is going to be a little more personalized in that these students meet insmall groups with whomever is running the session to go over the worksheet. The peer assistants would thengo to the help session ready to assist other students in the learning process.

If you think you would like to be a peer assistant, either because you want a jump on learning the material, orbecause you like to help others, please e-mail me in the next couple of days to let me know which reviewsession is your preference. You will then be contacted to whomever is running the review session to set up astanding meeting time to go over the material. So if Anna is running a Wednesday 5 to 6 pm session and youwant to work with her, e-mail to let me know and if selected, Anna will contact you about finding a commonprep time for all her peer-assistants. I will be setting up my own meetings with the peers as will the other TAs,so all together we will need 9 reviews x 5 students = 45 students.

9. If you did not receive an e-mail from me on Tuesday, chances are that you and the university disagree onyour e-mail address. Don’t tell me about it, rather, go to your personal page under UT Direct and make surethat what you think is your e-mail address is what the university thinks.

10. HW Service problems. A few of you, for reasons I do not understand, have multiple EID roles, whateverthat means. But you are the unlucky few that are unable to sign up for the HW Service with the directions Igave you. So if you go to the normal UT student/instructor access site: https://hs.utexas.edu/and things don’t work, try using the off campus guest link to get on and register. https://hw.utexas.edu/ If even that approach doesn’t work, e-mail and let me know.

.

11. UTeach Outreach. As I mentioned on Tuesday, there is a service learning course called UTeach Outreachthat allows you to earn graded college chemistry credit while teaching science in elementary schools aroundAustin. Basically you go with a partner twice a week for an hour to an elementary school and teach a sciencelesson. You are provided with the materials for the lessons and taught what to do. It is a fine program. If youare interested, come to ONE of the following orientation sessions in WEL 2.112 to learn more:

Thursday Jan 20th, 2-3pmFriday Jan 21st, 12-1pmMonday Jan 24th, 12-1pmTuesday Jan 25th, 2-3pm

Seats are limited so I wouldn’t wait till the last sessions to find out about the program.

12. Public Service Annoucements. I provide a service to students by allowing them to advertise reasonablestudent organizations and activities in the musings (this means I have to draw the line at debaucherous fratparties and raves). Just e-mail me before Wednesday at midnight and I will add it.

13. Poetry Corner. For those of you new to the class, a poem or two is read every week for the culturallychallenged. Personally I prefer dark, brooding angry male poetry. So if you want cheeriness and love, like onValentine's Day, you'll need to forward suggestions. For right now, it is winter (even if it gets to be 70 outsidethis week, it is still winter in our souls) and the new year so here are some appropriate poems. Actually itdescribes something pretty profound, the clash of old and new knowledge--new knowledge being that gainedfrom science and exploring. Notice Tennyson is unimpressed with it all. I thought you would appreciate thatTennyson questions whether anything about science is worth knowing. By the way, translate "aught" as"anything" here.

I stood on a TowerAlfred, Lord Tennyson (1865)

I stood on a tower in the wet,And New Year and Old Year met,And winds were roaring and blowing;And I said, "O years, that meet in tears,Have ye aught that is worth the knowing?Science enough and exploring,Wanderers coming and going,Matter enough for deploring,But aught that is worth the knowing?Seas at my feet were flowing,Waves on the shingle pouring,Old Year roaring and blowing,And New Year blowing and roaring.

Winter Songby Katherine Mansfield

Rain and wind, and wind and rain.Will the Summer come again?Rain on houses, on the street,Wetting all the people's feet,Though they run with might and main.Rain and wind, and wind and rain.

Snow and sleet, and sleet and snow.Will the Winter never go?What do beggar children doWith no fire to cuddle to,P'raps with nowhere warm to go?Snow and sleet, and sleet and snow.

Hail and ice, and ice and hail,Water frozen in the pail.See the robins, brown and red,They are waiting to be fed.Poor dears, battling in the gale!Hail and ice, and ice and hail.

And here is another favorite and quite appropriate for today’s thermodynamics lecture—actually an old song that hippiesfrom another time used to sing. Surely you know it, if only because someone sampled it for a hip hop song.

Signs Les Emmerson

Signs say long-haired freaky people need not apply.So, I tucked my hair up under my hat and I went in to ask him why.He said, "You look like a fine upstanding young man, I think you do."So I took off my hat and said, "Imagine that, me working for you."CHORUS:Signs, signs, everywhere there's signsBlockin' out the scenery, breakin' my mind.Do this, don't do that. Can't you read the signs.

Well the sign says, "Anybody caught trespassing will be shot on sight."So, I jumped on the fence and I yelled at the house,"Hey, what gives you the rightTo put up this fence to keep me out or to keep mother nature in.If God was here, he'd tell you to your face,"Man, you're some kind of sinner."

CHORUS"Hey now, mister, can't you read?You've got to have a shirt and tie to get a seat.You can't watch here, you can't eat.You ain't supposed to be here."

Sign says, "You got to have a membership card to get inside."

Sign says, "Everybody welcome. Come in, kneel down and pray."And when they passed around the plate at the end of it all,I didn't have a penny to pay.So, I got me a pen and a paper and I made up my own little sign.I said, "Thank you Lord for thinkin' 'bout me. I'm alive and doin' fine."