First Oral Exam

I had my first exam the other day. It was a strange experience, as it was an oral math exam. I sat in the prof's office, while he put problems on the white board and I had to solve them in front of him. It sounds a little nerve racking, but having been through it, it's really not so bad. In this case, the prof was cool enough to guide me along if I got a stuck, or if I made a stupid error, one that would normally screw up an answer and require lots of my time going through everything to find it, he would let me know that it should be a '-' here, etc.

It seemed like all of my complaints on how math was taught and tested in the past were addressed. Normally, we would memorize some key problems that we knew were going to be on an exam and then regurgitate them back onto the page during the exam, and the real trick to doing well was to not make stupid mistakes. This seems to test how well we can focus on the little details, although really doesnt test our true understanding of the topic. This individual testing seems to take care of that, as he could ask me anything he wanted, and all he really wanted to see was that I knew the general process for solving certain problems.

All in all, it was a strange experience, but I have 3 more.

On another note, Omar and Nina are coming down today...although I havent heard from them yet, they should be arriving at the main station this afternoon, hopefully good times will be had. I did a once over spring cleaning of my room, its almost spotless now, just like when I moved in.


k, I have more books to bury my face into...