Lim Min's Year 2 Semester 2 exam results:
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| For CY1500 Grade S - S/U module with Satisfactory. Semester GPA 5.0, cGPA 4.96 |
Well done, Lim Min. She obtains a perfect semestral GPA of 5.0 for the third consecutive time.
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Below are comments on the modules, written by Lim Min, for the benefit of her juniors.
Year 2 Semester 2 2015 (29 AUs)
Overall, not sure if my brain deteriorated or not, but this sem’s exams are harder than last sem’s.
HW0203 Research Writing in SPMS (3AU) (Ger-Core)
Lecturer: Dr Sujata S Kathpalia
Tutorial: Ms Audrey Cheng
Grading:
Class participation: 20%
Individual Critique Writing: 40%
Final Group Project Report: 40%
Overall Grade: A+
I attended only a few of the lectures. Maybe 4? Even if I attended, I might also sleep in it. I think you can totally not go for any of the lectures.
The tutorial teacher is really nice, friendly, and VERY approachable. She can be really funny too!! Hahaha.
I think this is the last time they are offering this mod. Yay! (\^o^/). After all, I think this is quite a pointless module. It is more towards humanities research writing than science research writing I think. A lot of the marks go to language (e.g. grammar). And the research project you do is like those where you use surveys or human samples to gather your data. It is like a mini PW project. Maybe it would have been better to have SPMS profs guide us, like agree/disagree with our project proposal, or let us choose a topic from their list. But of course this is not possible since there are too few profs for too many students.
Unbelievably, I got A+ HAHAHAHAHA!!! Must be because my 2 best friends helped me check for my grammar and sentence structure (and corrected quite A LOT)!!! All these grammar Nazis. This was possibly the most unexpected grade.
CE9001 Java and the Internet (3AU) (UE, minor-Computing)
Lecturer: Dr. Li Fang
Tutorial: Dr. Li Fang
Grading:
Test 1: (20%)
Test 2: (20%)
Final (29 Apr 2015, 1700-1900): 60%
Overall grade: A+
The notes are really detailed and self-explanatory. But going to the lecture can be a little useful. The lecturer can be really funny sometimes. Like the stuff she says can be quite cute.
Test 1 consists of 5 MCQs (3 marks each, that is like 3% of your overall grade each!! (XoX)) and 1 open-ended (which was really easy) for 5 marks. The MCQs are quite tricky, also, they test on some memory stuff like what will happen when you run this code? (runtime error? compile error? it runs fine? etc) So you got to know the meaning of the different errors. For this test, I suspect I got 17/20 as I didn’t know if it is compile or runtime error (I only know the code had error) and guessed wrongly.
Test 2 have no MCQ. It tests more on your understanding. Like fill in the codes, or what will this code output.
The final paper standard is similar to any other years. And the only thing you possibly need to memorise (other than coding syntax) is the 7 layers of OSI. If you can program, it should be quite easy to score. This is a 2 hour paper. I think I finished it in 1hr 45mins, because I wrote explanations which might not have been necessary, but just to play safe. But it's quite tricky though. Like some outputs are decimals, thus, have to remember to add a ".0" at the end.
MH4310 Coding Theory (4AU)
Lecturer: Dr. Fred Ezerman (first half), Dr. Nguyen Ta Toan Khoa (second half)
Tutorial: Dr. Fred Ezerman (first half), Dr. Nguyen Ta Toan Khoa (second half)
Grading:
Midterm test: 93/100 (25%)
Homework 1: 85/100 (12.5%)
Homework 2: 92/100 (12.5%)
Final (24 Apr 2015, 0900-1100): 50%
Overall grade: A+
The notes are self-explanatory, but going to the lecture helps as the lecturer writes stuff on the board which can be quite insightful at times. But there are too FEW people taking this mod!! So there is NO recorded lecture. I heard SPMS will not open the class if there are less than 10 students. Why are people not taking this mod??!!! I ENCOURAGE people to take this mod. The stuff you learn is quite cool, and the questions set are mostly direct application of what you know.
For the midterm test, this is the given stats:
Marks: 52, 88, 53, 32, 88, 43, 93, 26, 55, 71, 40, 58.
Mean: 58.25.
Standard Deviation: 22.39.
The last 20 marks question was really hard. Even reading the solutions, I find it quite hard to digest.
Homework 2 stats:
Marks: 95, 95, 50, 64, 88, 80, 36, 92, 72, 73, 90, 85, 76
Mean 76.62
Standard Deviation: 17.92
I think they changed some syllabus, thus, past year papers might not be really applicable. The final exam was really easy though. You can do all if you really understood everything in the lecture. The final paper was definitely way easier than the midterm. Choose 4 questions to do out of 5. I couldn’t do question 3 part b), So I left out question 3.
Since MAS didn’t have solutions for the past year papers, I did some questions of the 2014 paper (I could only do 4 out of 6 T.T). My solution can be found on the right. (MH4310 Coding Theory Past Year Paper Solution, some.) Password is mh4310. Not guaranteed correct.
MH3701 Basic Optimization (4AU)
Lecturer: Prof Chua Chek Beng
Tutorial: Prof Chua Chek Beng
Grading:
Labs: 4/3 (3%) (4 labs, each 1%)
Online quizzes: 12/12 (12%) unlimited attempts, 3 quizes, 12 qns
Midterm test: 24/25 (25%)
Final test: (60%)
Overall grade: A+
The lecturer is very patient, nice and clear. But his monotonous voice for the online lecture is really funny hahaha. The lecture is a MUST attend, because the slides have a lot of blanks to fill. But the slides fonts are really big, so I print 16 slides per page. He have notes and slides version, I think the slides version is sufficient. You don’t really have to touch the notes.
The midterm test is 100 minutes. 20 out of the 25 marks are giveaways. The mean is 16.65, median is 17. I spend quite long on the last question, luckily, I still managed to finish it. I lost 1 mark because my artificial problem had too many variables. (Note, artificial problem, make sure you introduce as little variables as possible).
The final paper was really HARD I think. 60 marks were really easy, anyone who studies can probably get all 60 marks. The last 40 marks was really hard T.T. There is not enough time!! I wrote quite a lot in front, (not sure if I could have done more short cuts). But the last 40 marks really require you to think quite some time. So I couldn’t finish thinking. It was 12m, 12m, 16m. The first 12 marks is 6 true/false questions, where they deduct 2 marks if you get it wrong. I didn’t dare fill in 2 of them because I was not sure what is the definition of a degenerate iteration and one of the question mentioned something about m non-zero and I have no idea what it was referring to. The b values or what?? I rather it be a true/false question with the requirement that we have to give an explanation on how we get it. The next 12 marks I could only prove 1 direction, it was really similar to the midterm qn but I didn't have luxury of time now. The last 16 marks I could show 2 solutions but didn't show exactly 2. I think I'm pretty dead for this paper. It was the most challenging paper among all the papers I took. I hope I can still get an A :/.
Just about 10 mins before the paper I actually sprained my leg -.-. So painful T.T. From the walkway to the road there EXISTS a step down. I end up having to spend the next week Lim-ping (the stupid pun a friend came up with).
MH3700 Numerical Analysis I (3AU)
Lectuer: Prof Viet Ha Hoang
Tutorial: Prof Viet Ha Hoang
Grading:
Midterm test: 100/100 (40%)
Final exam (7 May 2015, 1300-1500): 60%
Overall grade: A
This Prof the notes is REALLY self-explanatory. His notes, his tutorials, his solutions, are all extremely clear. So clear that you can totally skip all his lessons and not miss a single thing. But his lecture/explanations are really clear too. Maybe it is a 3AU mod, but the content for this mod is one of the least, I feel. I only spent about 1.5 days to study for the final paper. It is only 6 short chapters. It is a pretty straightforward mod.
The midterm has no programming question, and the final paper will have 1 programming question.
I couldn’t finish the last question for the final paper though. There is a bug that I haven’t correct due to the lack of time.
I thought I was quite confident of an A+ for this mod but I got an A hahahahahaha. Maybe the bug was not a bug but I was thinking on the wrong track!!
MH3110 Ordinary Differential Equations (4AU)
Lecturer: Dr Fedor Duzhin
Tutorial: Dr Fedor Duzhin
Grading:
Hard Assessment: 24/24 (24%)
Soft Assessment: 24/24 (24%)
Final exam (27 Apr 2015, 1300-1500): 52%
Overall grade: A
Dr Fedor loves to give online surveys and ask for students’ feedback. Even the hard assessment was voted by students. Which turned out to be the best 3 scores out of 5 papers (8 marks per paper). Soft assessment includes homework, assignments, clicker questions during tutorial slots. From the soft assessment you can get like more than double the max score (maybe 50 or something), thus most people get full marks for this -.-. I think of the hard and soft assessment of 48%, around 40% of the people got the full 48%..... Which means the final kind of decides your grade.
The homework/tutorial questions will not be gone through, instead, during tutorial slot, we have clicker sessions. Where there are 5 clicker questions to be done, and either Dr Fedor or his TAs will go through the clicker questions. As they go through, it is best if you copy down the solutions for most of it will not be uploaded.
The lecture might go a bit slow, but if you pay close attention, Dr Fedor does give loads of insights, with regard to how he thinks certain things. It is really cool. I love the clicker questions the most!! They are usually not your standard question, but really tests your thinking and application of what you know. Loads of the clicker questions are VERY insightful. The clicker questions are really fun.
Before the final paper, Dr Fedor will tell you what you need to study, which is really all that came up for the final paper. Out of 100, 90 marks are standard questions (very similar to clicker/hmwk question that he tells you to study). I think I didn’t do the 10 marks harder question properly, I think there is a huge hole in the claim I made. And one of the easier question I don’t know why I did it wrongly. It is like an illusion hahaha. That was worth about 5 marks? I am not sure. And many people did really well, so… hopefully I can still get an A. The questions are actually not easy, when you see it for the first time. But it is so similar to the tutorial/clicker questions that it becomes really easy because you just had to apply the same thinking.
I think getting full marks for the 48% and losing 15 marks for the final paper would bring you to the A- band already.
MH9000 Mathematical Problem Solving (2AU)
Lectuer: Dr Fedor Duzhin
Tutorial: Dr Fedor Duzhin
Grading:
I’m not really sure about the distribution, but there are attendance marks, class tutorial marks, homework marks, “final” paper which is the NTU Euler Math Competition paper.
Overall grade: A+
There are only 9 people in this mod. At the last lesson, Dr Fedor claims that everyone will get at least an A (even those who didn’t go for the “final” paper) because all of us put a lot of effort into the homework.
Every week, there will be a 2 hr class tutorial where 5 questions will be given and you solve in groups of 2-3 for 80 minutes, then each group will present certain questions that they have done. Every week, there is also a homework of 5 questions to be submitted online, and your peers will grade you. (This is quite cool especially when your peers have different cool solutions that you won’t think of). And of course if you are unhappy with your homework score, you can bring it up to Dr Fedor and he will grade it.
This mod is REALLY REALLY fun!! Especially when you can see how some of your peers solve certain questions, it is really cool!! I go OHH YAAAA so often in this mod.
The “final” paper has 5 questions, and like always, I can only do 1 out of 5. >.<
PS8001 Defence Science (3AU)
Lecturer: A lot of people from DSO/NTU
Final (30 Apr 2015, 1500-1900): 100%
Overall grade: Pass
This is a pass/fail mod. I didn’t attend a single lecture. But on the last lecture, the lecturer will actually go through 15 questions that will DEFINITELY come out in the final exam.
The final exam consists of 100 questions (of which many are recycled from previous years papers, so if you somehow have access to previous years papers good for you). I had an exam that ends at 7pm the day before, and I didn’t touch this mod at all until like 8.30pm on 29 Apr. So I only had like 8hrs to study everything. Which actually turn out fine. Just read all the slides, remember a bit here and there (I had some advantage as I know cryptography and those encryption things which was about 1/5 of the paper). I think there are about 10 topics, so about 10 questions from each topic. To pass is 40 marks, and the paper is really not hard at all. Even with my very bad memory and very bad guessing skills, I think I am quite confident of passing.
CY1500 Introductory Research Methodology (3AU)
Lectuer: Various CNYang Seniors
Tutorial: Various CNYang Seniors
Grading:
Can’t remember, confirm have report and presentation.
Overall grade: S
We were told we cannot SU this mod, but for some reasons, the SU option was available, so I just SUed it. Even though I heard that about 80% will get A/A+, but I was quite sure I am at the bottom 20%. Because I wrote my report pretty informally (thus losing a lot of marks), and my presentation was really bad. It started off well, but then my mind went blank and I had to flip the crushed script on my hand (I folded it really small as I thought I won’t need it) which ended horribly. The comment I got was “That long pause there was FATAL.”. Since it was so fatal, I just HAD to SU this. CNYang mods are SERIOUSLY PULLING MY GPA DOWN.
Haha I really could SU it… I ended up with an S…
