Week of 9/3

For my office hours this week, I had two students come on Friday, September 7 at 11 am. No one came to my hours on Wednesday because they were not informed of our available hours yet. Both the students that came to my hours had the same question about a Sapling homework problem. The problem was dealing with three vectors, A, B, and C that added to equal zero, and they needed to find the magnitude of A and B knowing C and the angle of A and B from the x axis. The problem the students seemed to be having was solving for one of the variables in one equation and plugging it into the other. They seemed to have no problem setting up some type of equation with the correct signs for the vectors; they were just unsure of how to continue from there. A concern they had was that the video modules were simple problems and they were never introduced to something with three vectors, so they found it challenging. With some guidance, they were able to go through the algebra and plug in the correct values to solve. Also, one of the students was slightly confused with dimensional analysis and the difference between adding and subtracting, and multiplying and dividing. With time and actual word problems with units in them, I think she will find it easier to compare units and solve for the correct value.