Unwinding and Test Back

The tutorial on October 15th went alright, and the second question [proving that T(2^k) = k +1] actually made a lot of sense to me. It gave me a bit of hope that maybe I could actually do okay in this course. I finally seemed to understand using the Induction Hypothesis within the Induction Step of going from n to n+1.
I was hoping that the quiz would be similar to this question, but I think it was more similar to the first question, which I missed because I was late. Hopefully since things in other classes have calmed down a bit I will be able to look at the tutorial exercises beforehand and get a feel of what the quiz might be like ahead of time. :)

In other news, today in class we got the test back, and I did worse than I was expecting, because I made a stupid mistake on both question 1 and question 2. I defined P(n) with "For all natural numbers n, blah blah blah". My friend pointed out that the reason you can't define P(n) for all natural numbers is because often that's what you are trying to prove. Duh! I felt pretty silly that I wrote it down that way, and coincidentally lost 2 marks. Oh well, that's my own fault. At least I won't do it for next time!

First Test

With the first test tomorrow morning, I must admit I am very nervous. This class is way over my head, and I don't even really know how to study. A1 did not go well at all, so I am very worried about how I will end up doing in this course. Luckily they try very hard to help people pass, by skewing the weightings of things, which is nice. It also shows that maybe this course shouldn't be as hard, or it shouldn't be required for a Comp Sci program.. Ah well, nothing I can do about that. I just have to try my best and that's all there is to it.

I think that I understand Mathematical Induction pretty well. It makes sense to me that if you can prove something for n, and if you can prove it for n+1, then it works for all n. The problem I have is getting from A to B. I understand the structure of the proof, but the content is where I have trouble. I don't think it's something you can learn, because once you prove something, it won't be asked on a test or assignment again. I don't really know how to get better at figuring out proofs, so if anyone has suggestions, please let me know. Thanks!

I also need to understand the other types of Induction we've gone over in class. Back to trying to study I go!

My Brain is Full of SLOG

Alright so first blog entry ever. Here goes!

I'm rather overwhelmed with school right now, and this course especially. I had a fair bit of difficulty in CSC165 last year, so I really need to force myself to do the work and practice in this course. I actually did find the first tutorial to be helpful, which was good, but since then I have had trouble understanding everything that goes on in class. I really need to keep up with the work and especially attend the dreaded Friday morning class!! If I manage to do that, I am hopeful that I will pass. With a little extra time and effort, perhaps I will even do well! Only time will tell.

Speaking of extra time and effort, I started the assignment rather late (due to other assignments and quizzes taking up my precious time and effort), so I am really only hoping to pass this time around. Once I'm finished tomorrow at around 11:58:59, I'll update you on how I think it went. Though my TA will know how it really went before I do..

Wish me luck on finding my way through the slog!