<p>Anyone else planning on taking him? The last time he taught was two years ago and he has pretty good ratings!</p>
<p>HAHAHA YES GRUNBAUM. </p>
<p>I had 54 last semester with Holtz and Grunbaum would substitute every now and then. But every time he did I always loved lecture! I loved it so much I decided to take 110 with him this semester. I’m not gna say I get up every TuesThurs at 8am just for him, but I go most of the time and every time I always find his performance brightens my mood for the rest of the day. He’s an older guy, and as most older guys, doesn’t give a f about what students think and says very entertaining things.</p>
<p>Idk about what 54 is like, but in 110 he has a HW fetish. He puts hw problems on our midterm. He has our HW worth 35% of our overall grade. The HW is graded. But other than that at least there aren’t any quizzes in 110 (54 is bound to be different with quizzes weekly, but who knows). </p>
<p>some of his favorite catch phrases / my favorite one-liners include “shut up and calculate,” “in the privacy of your room, take your fingers and…,” and “this isn’t coffee today… it’s wine”</p>
<p>grunbaum ftw :)</p>
<p>I don’t really like Prof Grunbaum, the man does not know how to write a proper midterm (see Math 110 midterm 1). Even the GSIs said it was horribly written.</p>
<p>I wouldn’t go so far as to say he has a homework fetish. There was only one problem from the homework on the midterm and that was only 10% of the midterm grade. Homework for 110 is also worth only 30% of the grade not 35%, not sure where you are getting your info from. Most upper-div math classes tend to allocate more points for hw. 4 questions from each homework assignment is graded and you get some credit for completion. Only solutions to the 4 graded questions are posted so that gets kind of annoying since you never know if your other solutions are right especially since there are so many proof type questions. You probably won’t face that problem in 54 since the solutions manual is freely available if you know where to look and 54 is just computation type of stuff.</p>
<p>I took 54 with Holtz last sem as well, although I skipped most lectures, I did attend one where Prof Grunbaum was substituting. It was on difeqns and I thought he did a terrible job lecturing. That said, his lectures in 110 are much better although you still need to spend a lot of time reading the book since he doesn’t cover that much material in class. </p>
<p>For 54, you don’t really need to care about lectures imo, the book explains everything very clearly and there are plenty of examples to follow. If you’re concerned about grade distribution, myedu shows that Prof Grunbaum gave 50% of some kind of As the last time he taught the class. I’m not sure about how Prof Holtz curves the class (grade dist data not available on myedu), I got an A and I know some people who did badly (Bs and B-s) on the mt and got As in the end.</p>
<p>EDIT: Prof Grunbaum also used to be the chair of the Math dept in the 90s if I’m not mistaken</p>
<p>yes, his differential equations lecture in 54 was terrible, especially because he was so hung up on his coupled oscillators. and yes, my bad 30% not 35%.
but whenever i’m in office hours with him he always seems to bring up and point to homework problems from his back pocket like he came up with them or something. just my $0.02</p>
<p>i personally enjoy his brand of teaching, it’s not the best and every now and then he gives the punch line before the set up for some theorems, making it hard to follow if you havent read, but i still feel he’s engaging and it does help me learn the material better.</p>
<p>copperback, " Most upper-div math classes tend to allocate more points for hw."</p>
<p>which math classes have you been in lol? i have never been in a upperdiv math course where the HW is more that 1/8 (12.5%) of the total grade. its usually 10% in my experience–in fact i don’t think i have ever had a course where the midterm(s) + finals is less than 75% of the total grade.</p>
<p>Math 128a/b this sem has 40% of the grade from homework, Math 121b has 20%. What I meant was that upper-div math classes seem to allocate more points for hw as compared to lower-div math classes. Most lower-div math classes have quizzes so the hw component counts for less. I agree that MT(s)+Final usually account for at least 75% of the grade but when there aren’t any quizzes, homework gets allocated more points.</p>
<p>40%!!! that’s crazy!!! even 20% is crazy; but thanks for clearing it up;</p>
<p>how do you like 128A? how is it compared to 104 or complex analysis? I took 104 and found it COMPLETELY DRY(not enough caffine in the world to keep me awake), complex analysis was alot better…</p>