Course Philosophy
Read, Discuss, Apply, Synthesize - The most efficient way of learning this subject is to first read the source material taking notes to summarize the essential concepts, then to clarify the most important and/or difficult points through discussion of questions and analysis, then to apply the concepts in order to understand salient examples and to solve problems, and finally to synthesize your knowledge of the fundamentals in order to analyze and explain a special topic/application. Because everyone is involved in this process, this model will allow us to cover more material with the (your) desired emphasis and depth on the topics.
Class organization
Class meetings throughout the year will either be used for discussion of the assigned reading or for homework presentations.
Discussion meetings
- Before each meeting period:
- Everyone: must read the assigned sections and prepare at least one discussion question for the following meeting. You must email your discussion question to me on the night before the meeting for review.
- Primary Discussion Leader: must read the assigned sections and prepare a written summary of the material (5-12 hand written pages). In addition to writing the notes, your responsibility is to have understood _as best you can_ everything in the assigned sections. If there is a question about a derivation or uncertainty about the interpretation of something, it is your responsibility to answer such a question. Where necessary, you should compose supplemental figures or plots to illustrate a key element from the material. You should complete these notes the night before and either email me a scanned copy or put a photo-copy in my departmental office mailbox so that I can review them and make photo-copies for distribution in class the next day. These summaries will constitute a cumulative class document of the course notes.
- Secondary Discussion Leader: must read the assigned sections and prepare at least one written example for class (with solution). The secondary leader must submit to me by email the example question(s) on the night before for review and so that I can review them and make photo-copies for distribution.
- Discussion questions: these questions should be created to stimulate discussion about the material and to explore your and your colleague's understanding of the material. They can be about something you did not understand or something you do understand and consider important for everyone to have understood or simply something you wish to discuss in more detail. Formulating a good question requires a certain minimum level of understanding.
- Example statements: these should constitute a short < 15 minute exercise/calculation which can be done by your colleagues in class and then discussed. They should illustrate how to apply a technique (or setup a calculation), or illustrate a physical order of magnitude relevant to the discussion.
- Summary: this document should be a cogent summary of the assigned material and constitute the notes you would write down on the board if you were to give a one hour lecture covering the reading. It should begin with brief summary of the contents and motivation, and should include only the most pertinent eqns./results from the text AND some analysis (or at least rephrasing) of the most important/subtle/difficult points. Ideally, it is more than just a copy of text.
During each meeting period (80 minutes divided into three periods):
- 1st third: Primary discussion leader provides the written summary notes and provides a ~30 minute verbal synopsis of the assigned material. This summary should also include material from additional sources and related literature.
- 2nd third: Secondary discussion leader then presents the prepared question to the class followed by a ~ 10 minute period for individual work on the problem. The secondary discussion leader will then lead the discussion period regarding the example question giving first his/her classmates the opportunity to answer the question and only referring the prepared solution if appropriate.
- 3rd third: This last period is reserved to cover the discussion questions prepared by each student.
Homework presentation meetings:
- During the class period prior to the homework due date, the solutions will be presented. You can either present your solution on the blackboard or make a power-point presentation. Please send me the .pdf before hand and you can show it from my computer.
- Timing: The time per presentation is limited to 20 minutes. This means no more than 15 min for the presentation and at least 5 min for questions and discussion ... and changing speakers. Normally you should not have more than 2 slides per minute.
- Content: Though the presentations are intended to generate discussion about the solution to the problem, it is not necessary to have solved it successfully to talk about it. Also, these presentations are also intended to help motivate the problem, so you should mention what you think is its significance and relevance to Laser physics. If you thought of different ways to solve a problem you should mention this as well as all assumptions and approximations you made and their significance. Some problems might be too long to discuss everything. Therefore, try to distill it to the important or critical points. You should not have detailed derivations or lists of equations - just show how to setup the problem and your results - we assume people can do the algebra.
Marking Scheme
Your mark will be determined on the basis of your class participation, homework assignments,
a written final project report (approximately 12 pages), an oral final project presentation (30 mins):
- 30% Class Participation
- 20% Homework
- 25% Written Final Project
- 25% Oral Final Project Presentation (during exam week)
Possible topics for the Final Project will be posted at a later date. You are also free to suggest a topic of your own choosing; however, it must be approved.
Your class participation mark will be determined on the basis of your discussion participation, your discussion presentations (1 to 2 for each student counting 20%) and homework your presentations (2 for each student counting 5% each).
