Thoughts on Test 1

When we got our tests back at the end of Thursday's lecture, I saw a lot of disappointed faces. Many students were expecting a much better mark than the one they received. A common complaint was that although their logic was solid and they understand the question perfectly, they were still docked one or two marks per question - and with a test out of 15, every mark taken off is about a 6% hit.

I got exactly the mark I was expecting - I messed up on the base case and a bit of the mathematical manipulation on the last question so I was expecting a significant loss for that, and I knew I had probably made some minor error in the previous questions. I didn't lose significant marks for structure, however, which was actually where many of my peers had faltered.

I was particularly careful on structuring the proofs properly, which included writing out the base case first, noting when I've used the IH, writing out the predicate, completing the proof with incremental conclusions (writing on one line, P(n) => P(n+1), and then on the next line, P(0) ^ P(n) => P(n+1), etc.), and writing the "Assume.." line out carefully. I pay attention to the form of the proof on tests because it really helps me organize my thoughts to have the logic carefully laid out on the page in a certain way - otherwise I can get confused. I'm really glad I've gotten into the habit of structuring everything carefully because it really saved me this time. I've also had friends who struggled with the course in previous years who mentioned that most of their  marks came from writing out the format properly, even when they weren't sure what the mathematical reasoning of the problem was supposed to be.

I think it would have been very helpful if we had had Assignment 1 returned a few days before the test - I think it is likely we will find that errors made in our assignments echoed in our tests. Because we hadn't been marked on anything prior to the midterm but a few very short quizzes, we couldn't have known what formal mistakes we had been making. For a lot of students, this could mean that they will have poor marks on two major components of the course, which really could have been prevented.