Opinions please.....

[gray_ghost]

On a scale of (1-10), how evil is this test? There are no trick questions, and all the problems are similar to what I have assigned for hw.
Imagine you are a music/philosophy/lit major, and your only friends in the world are a standard-normal distribution table and a scientifc
calculator.





Math 210 - Section 3 (Summer Session 2)
Date: July 25, 2005
Midterm 2

1. The table below lists the 10 closest stars to Earth along with
their distance in light years.

(a) What is the mean distance of a star on this list from Earth?

(b) What is the standard deviation?

Star Name	Distance (light years)
Proxima Centauri	4.24
Alpha Centauri A	4.34
Alpha Centauri B	4.34
Barnard's Star	5.97
Wolf 359	7.80
Lalande 21185	8.19
UV Ceti A	8.55
UV Ceti B	8.55
Sirius A	8.68
Sirius B	8.68

2. (a) What is the range? (referring to the table in problem 1)
(b) What can you say about the distribution of stars in our stellar neighborhood
from (a), and your answer to 1?


3. If Z is a random variable drawn from a standard-normal distribution, what is:

(a) P(-0.5≤Z≤2.4)?

(b) P(Z≥2.32)?

(c) P(Z≤-1.41)?



4. If X represents the distance of a star randomly selected from among the 30
closest stars to Earth, and the distances to these stars are normally distributed
with μ=9.828 light years, σ=2.4154 light years, then what is the probability
that X is between 8 and 11 light years from Earth?
[Source: Royal Observatory, Greenwich, UK]

5. What percentage of these stars are greater than 8 light years from Earth?
(again referring to problem 3)


6. Please describe, in your own words, the Central Limit Theorem and when to apply it.
Try not to write a novel. A short paragraph is all that I am looking for.


7. Fish are often contaminated with mercury, which can be toxic at fairly low levels.
A study in the early 1990s measured the level of mercury in hair samples of
residents of Kuwait. 68 females participated in the study. The mean level
of mercury contamination for the participants was 4.05 micrograms of mercury
per gram of hair, with a sample standard deviation of 4.43 micrograms per gram.
Find an 88% confidence interval for the mean mercury level in hair samples
from Kuwaiti females.

Comments

[elizabuffy.livejournal.com]

first of all, you're listening to the radio station i most commonly listen to when travelling to spokane :)

Now, onto the test: this is gonna be hell for me to place accurately on a scale as it's been years since i've taken a math class, and i've forgotten most everything i've learnt...I also haven't taken your class, so I have absolutely no clue how or what you've taught.

That being said, I'm gonna go with a 5. It sounds fairly easy and cut and dry to me, nothing that is purposely trying to cause problems and confusion. tho', really, it's math, and some people will have difficulties regardless.

Again, I really like your questions: they're fun, interesting, and easy to see how the principles are important in real life. The test also doesn't seem like a walk in the park, either.

~e! (who really, really, really hopes this doesn't sound all pretentious or like she's pretending to know what the hell she's talking about...'cos she really doesn't)

[gray-ghost.livejournal.com]

Yeah....94.5 rocks out pretty hard =) Nothing quite like Rob Zombie and Crystal Method to wake you up in the morning as you psych yourself up for swimming class.

I was putting the test out there to see if there were any questions phrased so oddly that no one but myself knows what the hell I am asking. The math professor I graded papers for last semester had a habit of doing that on tests. He would have 1-2 weird, illogical questions that made sense only to himself and no one else knew anything. And 1 question like that can screw an entire class up, because everyone spends time trying to answer that one weird mysterious question.

I wish my students were as enthusiastic as you =) Sadly, pretty much all of them approach my class the way you would a root canal.

[snash-attack.livejournal.com]

I know what a scientific calculator is, but what is a "standard-normal distribution table"?

those are interesting questions; and I'm sure I'd be able to answer them if I had taken your class...they really don't look very hard at all. But, then again, this opinion comes from someone who last took a math class in junior year of high school (*cough* 14 years ago *cough*) and it was Algebra 2. =)

[phendog.livejournal.com]

Having taken (and forgotten) this class two years ago, I'd say with a pretty good degree of confidence that I'd have found questions 1-5 standard and fairly easy to answer provided I didn't make any stupid mistakes.

Six would probably be easy if I remembered what the Central Limit Theorem was, and essay questions are always nice.

Seven looks a bit overwhelming; however, if this is similar to a homework problem, then it shouldn't be too bad provided one had a chance to see the correct solution to the homework and actually bothered to study.

I'd give it an evilness score of 3. aka not very evil.

[gray-ghost.livejournal.com]

hmmmm....you took the class that was probably for science majors (undergraduate probability or statistics). We're talking music majors here.

Well...hopefully they studied. And 7 was a problem I did in class (and they had hw problems like it too). So if they showed up to class and were paying attention, they should have no problems.

[phendog.livejournal.com]

Yeah, mine was scientific, though the textbook was worthless and the professor was a prat. We basically met in a group of about 6 or 7 of us once a week or so and taught ourselves using a guide off the internet. Interesting that we were also the ones who did best in the class...and I still felt like I didn't understand a thing when all was said and done.

*L* Poor music/art/lit majors. Oh well...having such a major does not excuse you from having to show minimal mathematic and logic abilities. Especially if allowed a calculator. And it's not like science majors don't have to show proficiency in literature, history, and yes, in my case at least...art.