Section 2.3 - due September 1

First of all, I still think that it is really awesome that Dr. Jenkins has his picture on the front page of a magazine and a whole article about his work. Way to go! Now on to the theoretical processes of numbers - This section was mostly a review of Abstract Algebra again with a few new things.  What I want to know is why these authors insist on saying everything so cryptically.  I have to read through almost every proof at least twice so that I understand what they are doing, even the proofs from Abstract Algebra.  I did think, however, that the use of standard prime factorization to find the GCD and the LCM was probably about the niftiest thing I've seen in awhile. I felt like sitting down and doing a page of computations just for fun. I kind of miss the good ol' computation days. Aaah! Those were the days!

Sections 2.1 - 2.2 - due on August 31

These sections were more of a review of material that was covered in Abstract Algebra so it seemed familiar, but the way that the author explained it was so different from the book we used in Abstract Algebra that I had to read through some things a few times to follow what they were saying. The Division Algorithm was the most different to me. I'm not sure if I'm remembering it correctly but it seemed like it was much more straightforward and easier to follow in the other book. It was really nice to have a few sections of review though to refresh my memory of all the good times in Abstract and the nifty things we learned in that class.

Introduction - due on August 31

I am a senior studying Math Education. I have just started my last semester of classes and will start my student teaching in January. I am applying to do my student teaching in Washington DC and will find out in October if I got into the program. (keep your fingers crossed!) After I graduate, I want to move back to Salt Lake and teach at my old high school with two of my favorite teachers in the whole world! I have taken linear algebra, multi-variable calculus, differential equations, theory of analysis, and abstract algebra here at BYU. I am taking this class because it is a part of my major's requirements for graduation. I do like working with modular arithmetic though and would like to see some of that in this course.  Probably my favorite professors/teachers have been those that out effort into getting to know their students and how we learn individually.  They seemed to truly care about what we got out of their class and genuinely wanted us to succeed.