Calculus Labs

Teacher's Responsibility

• You must know in detail what is covered in each lab.
• You must grade at least two written reports, including the first written report.
• In your lectures you should try to make as many connections as possible to what students do in the classroom to what they do in the lab. For example, during a lecture you might point out that "in lab tomorrow you'll see a beautiful application of this result."
• You should make sure that some of your test questions are taken from labs.
• You must communicate regularly with your lab assistants, including before and after each lab.

Handling Reports

• Give students a clear indication of what you expect them to do for each report. For example, here is a handout (Blake 2005) which L. Blake uses to let students in Math 31L know about their teacher's expectations for their first report. This handout (Blake 2006) is a similar one for students about to write their first report in Math 32L (on the probability & geometric series lab).
• Thnik about how you will grade reports, and the let he students know. One strategy is to break down the various parts of the lab to be graded and assign a certain number of points to each part. But be sure to include some way to reward students who use complete sentences, spell correctly, use correct grammar, etc. Another method is to make yourself a rubric something like this grading rubric which L. Blake uses for the Probability and Geometric Series Lab
• It's all right for your report requirements to differ from those in the lab manual. For example, here are some slightly modified instructions for the Newton's Law of Motion lab report used by L. Blake. You should also keep in mind that each week at the "lab prep" meeting for the lab assistants, such alternatives will be explained to the lab assistants. Just be sure that you communicate clearly with your lab assistants both before and after the lab meets each week.