Category Archives: Introdution (Chapter 1)

Week One Meeting: §1.1 – §2.2

Week One’s Archived Video

For those who may have missed it, the video recording of our first meeting follows below.

I would usually intimate that some may also use it for review, but it primarily contains a brief overview of some of the resources available along with some administrative material overview. It’s much more scant on actual mathematics than I hope/expect they will generally be in the future.

Administrative Note

It appears that we had over 20 people for the first session, though we’re limited to 10 active participants who have access to streaming their audio/video into the session. Apologies to others who weren’t able to more actively participate.

Keep in mind that one should hopefully still be able to add additional material via the hangouts IM functionality or by the Q&A functionality (see notes below). For those who are in the audio/video portion of the hangout, you’ll be expected to participate and contribute to the discussion.s (Perhaps you might present a problem/solution to the group?)

If you don’t have much to say (or don’t have the proper equipment (webcam or microphone)), kindly “step” out of the broadcast and watch the live stream for a while and allow others to have a shot as well. Perhaps we might arrange some method for people to rotate in/out on a regular basis? Suggestions for this are welcome.

Those not actively participating in the session can always watch the live stream through the group’s YouTube channel.

I did notice one or two interesting side-conversations taking place within the hangout’s chat (though I’m at a loss to know if/where it was archived). At present, we’ve got more than enough time in these sessions that instead of typing respondents are more than welcome to bring up their commentary to supply everyone with a more fleshed out conversation. (There does seem to be a difference between the IM/chat within the main window of the stream and that from the separate hangouts window, which is archived and accessible after the fact, so perhaps using the latter is preferable for archive purposes, as well as being more accessible to the balance of the group.

Questions

Google Hangouts has a functionality known as Q&A to which one can write in questions that the group can work on answering during the session.  To access it at any time, go to the page for the hangout, click on the “play button” in the video portion of the screen, then in the top right hand corner of the “video” (which obviously won’t be playing until the set meeting time) click on the 3×3 square grid (just to the right of the question mark icon), and choose the Q&A pop up option. This will open up a bar on the right hand side of the screen where one can click on ask a new question at the bottom to post their question.

You can also always register at the group’s main site and post your questions there for everyone to work on/answer via the comments section during the week

Coming Up: Week Two §2.3-§3.2

This week’s Google Hangout (RSVP here) will cover problems/questions from week two of the syllabus:

  •  2.3 Ologs
  • 3 Fundamental Considerations in Set
  • 3.1 Products and coproducts
  • 3.2 Finite limits in Set

Everyone will generally be expected to have read the appropriate sections and bring their questions/issues so the group can attempt to cover and clarify any issues anyone may be having.

If it helps one or more people to ensure that they’ve got the material down well, I’m sure the group would welcome anyone who might like to present/walk their way through one or more of the problems in the relevant sections – particularly problems whose answers left out some reasonable level of detail. If you’d like to offer to do this, please put a comment in below, so we can schedule some time during the session to accommodate this.

Though we’re off to a “slow” start, things will pick up rapidly as we progress, so please don’t hesitate to ask questions here on the blog, through hangouts, or via anyone’s office hours.

Online Video Conference Meetings

Now that we’re a few days into the group and most everyone seems to be registered and has had some time to respond to the initial questionnaire, I thought I’d set a time for our online meeting(s)/sessions.

Most people have indicated to me that they’ve either already bought/received the text and have started reading, or are about to begin. I have a feeling  that most will find the first several chapters very basic, (but we’re all here to help those that don’t).

There are currently 25 people registered!

As a reminder, as mathematically “sophisticated” readers, we’ll be using a “flipped” format for our meetings, so everyone will generally be expected to have read the appropriate sections and worked on some problems/examples ahead of the meetings so that they can bring any problems/issues they may have to get some help from the rest of the group.

Upcoming meetings

As an initial meeting, let’s aim for:

Friday, June 5, 2015 at 6:45 pm Pacific / 9:45 pm Eastern on Google Hangouts.

In this session, we can get any  basic administrative things out of the way and discuss any problems/issues anyone may have with the first two chapters which primarily cover some initial basics including set theory and functions.

For our regular, weekly standing meetings, let’s shoot for

Monday evenings at 6:45pm Pacific / 9:45 pm Eastern.

Hopefully this weekly time will work for those on both coasts of the Americas without any undue burden.  We can attempt to record sessions for those who aren’t able to make it due to time zone or other conflicts, but no one seemed to have any issues with Mondays and we seem to be roughly split with participants on both coasts.

The second meeting will be on:

Monday, June 8, 2015 at 6:45 pm Pacific / 9:45 pm Eastern on Google Hangouts.

We’ll cover everyone’s questions from the following sections (which everyone will have been expected to have read beforehand):

2.3 Ologs; 3.1 Products and coproducts; and 3.2 Finite limits in Set

If necessary, outside of this, we can try to hold an alternate time on Saturday, which was the other day no one seemed to have issues with. An earlier time may help those who live outside the Americas as well. Anyone who’d like an alternate time is invited to mention it in the comments below.

Due to platform requirements and the diversity of the participants, Google Hangouts seems to work for everyone and allows video, audio, screensharing, and most of the other useful features we might want.  As I recall, one doesn’t necessarily need a Google+ account, but can login through their gmail interface (typically with a browser plugin), or via the hangout app on the bigger cell phone platforms.

You can click on the individual links for the appropriate date to find/join the particular hangout on this page (above), or on the individual links listed within the syllabus.

Office Hours

As a reminder, most participants have indicated office hours during which they are available to chat with others to offer assistance or help. I’d hope that everyone would try to login to Google Hangouts and make themselves relatively available to others to offer assistance, if they’re able during their stated office hours. Remember that helping others can assist you in reviewing/clarifying the material for yourself as well.

As always, additional assistance can also be easily had by making a post here to the “blog” with a specific question or problem and everyone can take a stab at helping out through the comments on that particular post.

If you haven’t already done so, feel free to do the following:

We all look forward to seeing you soon!