Physics 2010                                Sid Rudolph
Fall 2007                                   Homework Policy


Some Rules:
     1.   Remember, the total homework score that is folded into your final
          grade is up to 100 points, i.e. as much as a mid-semester exam.
     2.   Over the course of this semester there will be 28 HW assignments.
          Those assignments will be based mostly on questions and problems from the text.
          Additional initial assignments will be done to familiarize
          you with WebAssign, the web-based HW delivery and grading system you will use, 
          and a short math practice assignment. Neither of these initial assignments will 
          count in the acual homework grade.
     3.   If you go the the main Physics 2010 web page there is a link to WebAssign
          Click here.  On 
          the left of that web page is a link to the Student Guide for WebAssign.  You can 
          also get to the Guide from a link in one of the Announcements located on your 
          WebAssign homepage. Clicking on that link will take you to a page containing the 
          table of contents for all the information you will need to use WebAssign.  Please 
          spend some time going through this guide.
     4.   At the end of the semester the scores on the 3 poorest assignments will be
          dropped and the remaining 25 scores will be totaled and scaled to a percent score.
     5.   The vast majority of the homework questions and problems will come from the text.
          However, because of the capabilities built into WebAssign, many of the problems 
          have been substantially altered and embellished.  As you will likely notice, all
          of the Conceptual Question, which the text usually allows for open-ended essay
          responses, have been converted into multiple choice and multiple select questions.
          In some cases multiple test questions have been combined into a single WebAssign 
          question with multiple parts.
     6.   Homework will be submitted in accordance with the WebAssign deadlines.  Your final 
          HW submission must be done no later than 7:00 am on the Wed. and Fri. after the day 
          (Tues. and Thurs.) the problems from the assignment were discussed in your discussion 
          section, except for the 4 Sunday assignments following a Friday exam.  These 4 
          assignments must be submitted no later than 8:00 am on the following Sunday, 
          i.e. the Sunday after the Friday exam.  One of the primary purposes of the discussion 
          class is to go over the HW problems (and questions) and deal with questions related to 
          them. Since the final submission is after your discussion section meets there is no 
          reason for any of you not to get an excellent homework score. Remember: all assignments 
          will be graded, and this means all items in the assignment will be graded. Assignment 
          solutions will also be posted the day after they are due on the WebAssign site.  One of 
          the Announcements accessible from the main WebAssign page after you log in will explain 
          how to display homework solutions after the submission deadline is past.  The early 
          morning deadline on the Wed., Fri., and the Sundays after exams was implemented to assist 
          students with evening work schedules for whom a midnight deadline, the deadline in 
          previous years, would be too difficult to meet.  I would hope most of you would finish 
          and submit your assignments sometime on the previous day.
     7.   As you will discover this homework system has been set up to give you multiple
          opportunities (5) to work out correctly your assignment.  Only the grade as of
          your last submission will be recorded.  You really will have lots of chances
          "to get it right". 
     8.   All items in an assignments: Conceptual Questions and Problems will be graded.  
          Item worth will be pretty much equal, 2 points for the majority of items with a 
          very infrequent 1.0 point multiple choice question or problem items, especially those 
          problem items preceded with the ssm.  WebAssign will do the 
          grading of all the assignments, display the solution key, and record the grade 
          in a grade book you can look at any time you wish.  Note: if you display the 
          solution key before the submission deadline WebAssign will not permit you to do 
          any more work on the assignment.  One grading issue to be aware of: on a number 
          of multiple choice items, the amount of points you can earn will decline the more 
          submissions you make.  For example, in some, but not most, multiple choice items 
          you will get full credit, usually 2 points, if you get the item correct on the 
          first or second attempt.  However, on the next attempt, the maximum score on the 2 
          point item is 1.5 points; on the next submission 1.0 points, and on the last submission, 
          0.5 points.  This is the case on many multiple choice questions, usually on those with 
          at least 4 answer possibilities.  The obvious reason for the declining point values 
          with later submissions is to discourage wild guessing and zero effort on these items.
     9.   Any assignment not submitted by the 7:00 am (or 8:00 am for the 4 Sundays mentioned 
          above) deadline will receive the grade of zero. Late assignments will NOT be accepted.  
     10.  Even if you cannot complete an assignment by the deadline, submit what you have done by
          the deadline time.

  

Warning!! The homework part of the grade counts as much as an exam.  The difficulty level
will vary from assignment to assignment and problem (question) to problem.  Typically, the
second and even third assignment from a chapter will have more difficult items than the 
first assignment from that chapter. Some may be fun!  And I am NOT crazy!

Please keep up with them.