Course Updates

Major updates/improvements to the course are listed here. These improvements are driven by student feedback, so be sure to speak up if you have ideas! 

Future updates 

  • Personalized feedback based on just your responses. Currently writing scripts to collect the feedback and determining easiest method to send personalized pdfs to students. 
  • Improved feedback on homework and exams, including critical step hints. Currently making structural changes to facilitate providing the feedback.
  • Xronos system update. This is being done by the OSU Ximera team Links to an external site..

Fall 2020 - Current semester

  • [upcoming] Rerecord 55 content videos to align with new content notes.
  • Submitted ~$300,000 3-year grant to support major improvements to course. 
  • Increase to 10 Progress Quizzes on 2 Modules each from 6 Progress Exams on 3 Modules each.
  • Increase to 10 questions per Module from 5.
  • Major streamline of test-taking process to accommodate Honorlock and increases to Quiz number and size.
  • Removal of all hybrid sections. Student interactions with TAs have been revised and are monitored more closely.

Summer 2020

  • Revised homepage to provide important links at the top of the page.
  • Inclusion of "Best Score on Module #" to front of gradebook to ease grade estimates. 
  • Release of Excel sheet to calculate and predict final grade.
  • Various quality-of-life improvements to automated exam generation, including:
    • Increasing font size to 14pt;
    • Significantly increasing graph sizes (usually to 22pt);
    • Improved spacing for options with many intervals; and
    • Revising intervals to no more than 2 decimal places.
  • Revisions to weekly assignments and group sizes.

Spring 2020

  • Restructured weekly assignments to provide hybrid and online students the same types of assignments and improve student interactions.
  • Revised the test-taking process to accommodate both ProctorU and Honorlock.
  • Increase to 5 Progress Exams on 3 Modules each from 4 Progress Exams on 4 Modules each.
  • Finished adding question structures to cover all course objectives. This included rewriting previous question structures to be more specific. 
  • Wrote notes for each objective to help students take notes from videos/homework.

Fall 2019

  • Again streamlined the test-taking process.
  • Tested various graded assignments to count as alternative mastery of a module.
  • Added more automatic questions structures to exams. 
  • Removed Matrix Advanced Module due to lack of interest.
  • Rerecorded videos to more accurately reflect presentation of questions on homework and exams.
  • Submitted ~$200,000 2-year grant to support major improvements to course.

Summer 2019

  • Began statistical analysis of questions to remove poorly-predictive questions and improve ambiguous questions.
  • Evaluated all content for appropriateness and coverage of necessary College Algebra topics.

Spring 2019

  • Revised how exams were presented to students to ease test-taking.
  • Added additional feedback to automated keys.
  • Refined free online homework system. 
  • Refined exam generation software. 
  • Refined key generation, including:
    • Adding more feedback to options;
    • Revising the format to make the key more readable; and
    • Improving the display of graphs.

Fall 2018

  • First implementation of free online homework system.
  • Introduced 3 tracks for Advanced Modules: Limits, Modeling, and Matrices.
  • Developed some automated questions for advanced modules.

Summer 2018

  • Initial development of an open-source (free), online homework system.
  • Refined exam software based on student scratchwork and feedback during Spring 2018.

Spring 2018

  • Restructure to Mastery-Based grading.
  • Increased number of during-semester exams from 3 to 4.
  • Recorded new, short videos associated to each learning objective outlined in the course.
  • Developed automated exam generation software to create quality multiple-choice questions. This removed all free-response questions from exams.
  • Developed automated keys for exams. This provided students feedback based on how they answered questions rather than just stating the correct answer.