Survey of Astronomy AST110-6, Fall 2006

 

12:00 noon – 1:15 pm, Tuesday and Thursday

 

Instructor: Prof. Haosheng Lin

Phone: 808-876-7600-110 (Maui Office)

Email: lin@ifa.hawaii.edu

Office Hours: Watanabe 423, 10:00 AM-12:00 PM, Tuesday and Thursday.

 

Since I am based on Maui, my time in Honolulu and in the Manoa campus is very limited. If you have questions you need ask outside of the office hours, please e-mail me. I’ll also accommodate the best I can request to meet outside of the scheduled office hours, if you give me advanced notice so I can arrange for it.

 

Teaching Assistant: Ms. Tiantian Yuan

Phone: 808-956-0982

Email: yuantt@ifa.hawaii.edu

Office Hours: Watanabe 402, 11:30 noon to 12:30 pm, Monday and Wednesday. You are also encouraged to contact Ms. Yuan by e-mail outside of the regular office hours for questions.

                       

Text Book

 

The prescribed textbook for this course is “The Essential Cosmic Perspective” by Bennett, Donahue, Schneider, and Voit. The lectures will follow the organization and content of this book closely. The materials for the quizzes and exams will mostly be extracted from this book.

 

The textbook provides free access to www.astronomyplace.com, which is designed to help you with your study with textbook. It provides chapter summaries, additional information on Common Misconceptions and Mathematical Insights, and a suite of interactive tutorials, and animated and narrated movies. This is a valuable resource, and you are strongly encouraged to utilize this website.

 

A planetarium program called “SkyGazer” comes free with the textbook on a CD-ROM. You can use this program to learn about the constellations, find the position of the stars, the planets, and other objects in the sky at any given time and location.

 

Lecture Notes and Homework Assignment Online

 

The lecture notes will be deposited on line at http://www.ifa.hawaii.edu/users/lin/ast110-6/index.html after the classes. Homework will be accessible online also.

 

Grading Policies

 

Homework: (30%)

The homework will be assigned approximately once a week (except the weeks for the mid-term and final exams), and due a week later at the beginning of the class. No late homework will be accepted without a legitimate reason (such as medical emergency). Most of the homework assignments will require answers of a few sentences or a short paragraph, doing simple calculations, and sometimes making drawings.

 

I am assuming all of you have access to computer and the world-wide-web. The homework will be distributed electronically. The homework will be posted on the web page of this class (http://www.ifa.hawaii.edu/users/lin/ast110/index.html). If you don’t have access to the web, please let me know. We will make paper copies of the homework available to those who need it.

 

Quizzes: (20%)

A short (approximately 5-10 minutes) quiz will be given weekly at the end of one of the classes. The questions will be based on the materials covered in the lecture given in the previous week.

 

Midterm Exams: (20%)

Tuesday, October 10th, 12:00 noon - 1:15 pm.

 

Final Exam: (30%)

Thursday, December 14th, 2006, 12:00 noon-2:00 pm.

 

The midterm and final exams will be multiple-choice questions, Please make sure that you bring #2 pencils to the exams. Please also bring a photo-ID with you.

 

Make-up exam will only be allowed in case of emergency. Request for early exam for early departure for holiday will not be accepted. Students who are late for the exams will not be admitted to the test once at least one student has already left the room.