We will be using some aspects of the “Just in time teaching” (JiTT) techniques developed by Novak, Patterson, Garvin and Christian. One part of this technique uses web-based assignments due shortly before class. These assignments are quizzes designed to test your understanding of assigned reading material. There are reasons for this – the obvious one is to get you to actually do the reading. The second is to help use class time more efficiently. If you read something in the text and understand, good, there's no point in spending a lot of time on it in class. This frees up class time to spend on specific areas that you might be having trouble with. Finally, it's a small preparation for the kind of learning you will probably have to do in the real world, i.e., reading and understanding technical texts.

The quizzes will consist of five multiple-choice questions, the grading of the quiz will be pass/fail. Passing is only two out of five. I want you to read the chapter; if you do this, you should be able to pass easily. I also want to know what is less clear in the reading, so the cutoff for passing is low. We will spend the start of the lecture going over this topic in more detail and maybe working some problems. Then we'll start with new material. If you read something in the text and understand, good, there's no point in spending a lot of time on it in class. This frees up class time to spend on specific areas that you might be having trouble with.

These web assignments and the corresponding reading will be in the course web pages in Blackboard. The assignments are due by 9:00 am the morning of that class. The reading assignments will be around 10 pages and the web assignment should take you 10 to 15 minutes. There will be about 17 total – a little more than one per week. The two lowest scores out of 17 total will be dropped. This also means no excuses for missed assignments, the only valid excuses will be if the server crashes the night before or if you have a note from the dean. No late quizzes will be accepted; don't waste the two “drops”. The web assignments will be worth 10% of your final grade. The reading listed below on the day of a web assignment is that required for completing the assignment. The schedule will change occasionally; changes will be announced in class and in Blackboard.
 

Date	Class material	Reading, quiz
Mon. 01/22	Radiation	Quiz 1: Sections 3.2, 3.3.1, 3.3.2
Fri. 01/26	Material properties continued, scattering, Group & phase velocity	Quiz 2: 3.5
Fri.. 02/02	Scattering	Quiz 3: 4.2
Wed. 02/07	Refraction, Fermat’s principle	Quiz 4: 4.4.2, 4.4.3, 4.5
Mon. 02/12	Lens combinations, stops	Quiz 5: 5.3
Fri. 02/16	Mirrors.	Quiz 6: 5.4
Fri. 03/02	Optical Systems	Quiz 7: 5.7.1, 5.7.2
Wed. 03/21	Thick lenses, optical engineering	Quiz 8: 8.1
Fri. 03/30	Interference	Quiz 9:
Wed. 04/04	Diffraction	Quiz 10
Wed. 04/11	Fourier Optics	Quiz 11
Fri. 04/20	Lasers	Quiz 12
Fri. 04/27	Holography	Quiz 13