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Jeffrey Manning
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Professor Manning is great! He's one of those professors who "works behind the scenes". His midterms are quite lengthy but proportionally easy and the final (taken during the pandemic) was hard (but fair, considering it was take home). His lectures are fun and he tries his best to make it engaging. He takes doubts meticulously.
P.S. if you EVER have the opportunity to learn from Joseph Breen for your TA, take it blindly. No second thoughts. Gosh he's so helpful that I'd take an entire class even if the professor wasn't good. Now if you don't get Joe as your TA, then be sure to go to his YouTube channel for quality content on 31b, 32a, 32b. You won't regret it.
This class was harder than I expected. I learned that I hate proof-based math lol. The lectures were fine. Manning is an alright lecturer but there were often times when he'd stumble over his words or he'd ask a question to the class and no one would respond leaving an awkward silence for like a minute. The homeworks every week were honestly pretty time consuming and were graded pretty harshly. I'd recommend doing/attempting the homework honestly to make sure you secure that HW grade and prepare yourself for the tests. The tests were pretty hard and I often didn't have enough time to really finish at least for me (although the class averages seemed pretty decent). I think the class/final was curved significantly which ended up giving me a B (i'm not complaining tho). Don't be fooled into thinking this is an easy math class because its not calc or something. You'll have to put time in studying and doing hw for sure.
Professor Manning is a beast! Great explainer, super helpful (literally answered every question I had in the class, even if they weren't related to math at all), and genuinely cares about students. Also, he's an actual genius. He is insanely smart and just as kind. I would highly recommend taking this course with him (or really any course, to be honest). He's awesome. Godspeed Professor Manning.
Loved professor Manning’s 115B. I took it during the zoom era, so he actually recorded pre-lectures for each lecture. He used the 30ish minute pre-lectures to teach the material, and actual lecture was more to answer questions and give examples. And in general, the lectures were structured well, and the concepts were explained clearly. Everything was motivated nicely as well. As for hw, there’s a weekly problem set of about 8 questions, and they really helped improve my proof skills (I had only taken 115a before). Also, a lot of the hw questions were quite insightful since they introduce interesting topics not covered in class, and walk you through, using subquestions, a more complicated proof of some property or idea. The exams were also fair and interesting, though that might be because we were given 24 hrs and an entire week for the midterm and final, respectively. Overall, I highly recommend professor Manning.
As a person who enjoys mathematics and is trying to double major in math, I absolutely loved Manning's 32A class. He started off a bit quiet and shy, but by week 3 he was teaching concepts as clearly as any professor could. A lot of us felt that he spent an unnecessary amount of time on Kepler's laws but that was only because he was moving faster than the other lectures. This is my breakdown of different parts of the class:
Proofs of concepts such as curvature/tangent planes: extremely detailed, sometimes hard to follow
Examples: Manning covered a lot of important examples in class that showed us how to go about solving any problem. He didn't leave it to us to look into the textbook or online to see how a question is solved.
Tests: Both the midterms had a reasonable level of difficulty that you can expect from any math midterms and he curved up a tiny bit. The exam being a take-home final due to the Coronavirus situation was tougher and much longer than the midterms but was doable within the 24-hour window given to us.
Helpfulness: Although Mannings lectures can be daunting, he is an extremely nice person and always answers the smallest of questions in class and office hours and makes sure you understand the concepts.
Homework: The homework which is given weekly is helpful and never too difficult so if you are punctual and dedicate around 1.5 hours a week to the homework, you can secure full credit.
Lastly, if Joe Breen is TAing any of your math class, just take it blindly - you'll thank me later.
Professor Manning seemed quite nervous at the start of the quarter, as this was his first quarter teaching Math 32A. By nervous, I mean his voice was quite strained, he was stuttering and tripping over his words, and sounded like he was about to die from asphyxiation. However, by Week 5, he had built up marked confidence in his lectures and in fielding student questions. He also switched from a thin chalk to a thick chalk, which was extremely helpful, as students further than the first few rows were not able to even see the thin-chalk writing. He used red, blue, and orange thin chalk, which were substantially fainter than his standard thick white chalk.
Professor Manning emphasized and explained linearization very well; he also emphasized multivariable calculus as an extension of single-variable calculus by analyzing single-variable topics in a multivariable context.
Due to COVID-19, the final was a 24-hour take-home exam (agreed upon by the Math department), so there was no pressure for the final. I think there were too many questions on the first midterm (six instead of four or five). However, standard test-time-budgeting techniques can get you through.
Steven Gagniere is a decent TA. He is very humorous and explains the topics well. He occasionally expands on the material, which is greatly appreciated. From what I heard, though, Joseph Breen is even better!
I felt Prof. Manning put a lot of effort in really trying to explain the material well and make us get the intuition through visualizations, which I really appreciated. At times I felt he could have done a better job during lecture. For example, the first few weeks I could hardly read what was on the board because he was writing too lightly, and he would definitely benefit from a mic because it’s sometimes hard to hear him. Also, whenever he asks a question to the class, there would always be an awkward pause since nobody would answer him. The homeworks are all pre-written for you so you don’t need the textbook to do the homework, which I thought was nice. The tests were pretty challenging, but they were reasonable, and I felt like it was because he was actually trying to evaluate our true understanding of the material. Overall, he’s a pretty good teacher who tries to make the class engaging and challenging.
I think this class is pretty basic? I didn't do that well but generally, it's not stressful; it doesn't feel like theres an overwhelming amount of information at all... if you are a math major or generally smart I'm sure you will do great in this class. The midterms aren't exactly tricky, theres just maybe around 1 hard question, but its easy to lose points if you don't know how to prove something but the proofs aren't super tricky either. the Final had some more difficult proofs. Manning seems like a nice guy, his lectures sometimes feel a bit slow but if you can focus and follow along thats all you need. I dont know. this class felt basic but its not hard to do not good if that makes sense
The professor had good lectures that were helpful. Sometimes they weren't directly related to what we were tested on (e.g. he derived kepler's laws but he would never ask those kinds of things on a test). The exams were actually pretty straightforward. The problem is that it's kinda hard to finish his exams on time. Also, sometimes he uses pretty big/ugly numbers and expressions in his problems, which is kind of annoying. Overall good professor.
Manning is perhaps my favorite math professor as of now. As a person, he's really nice and makes sure you understand the topics being discussed and encourages people to ask questions if they are confused. He doesn't get annoyed at all when people ask questions, even if it's something that was covered multiple times in lecture. As a professor, he is very thorough when introducing new concepts. He spends a lot of time explaining why the concepts matter and slowly introduces them instead of just throwing it at the students all at once. The homework questions are mainly from the textbook, which was good because you could look up answers if you really needed to (I HIGHLY suggest against doing so because struggling in math is how you learn). Most homework assignments oftentimes introduced some new concept which felt frustrating at first, but turned out to be helpful since it helps you learn how to work with brand new ideas. Overall, a pretty good class and would definitely take his class again.
Professor Manning is great! He's one of those professors who "works behind the scenes". His midterms are quite lengthy but proportionally easy and the final (taken during the pandemic) was hard (but fair, considering it was take home). His lectures are fun and he tries his best to make it engaging. He takes doubts meticulously.
P.S. if you EVER have the opportunity to learn from Joseph Breen for your TA, take it blindly. No second thoughts. Gosh he's so helpful that I'd take an entire class even if the professor wasn't good. Now if you don't get Joe as your TA, then be sure to go to his YouTube channel for quality content on 31b, 32a, 32b. You won't regret it.
This class was harder than I expected. I learned that I hate proof-based math lol. The lectures were fine. Manning is an alright lecturer but there were often times when he'd stumble over his words or he'd ask a question to the class and no one would respond leaving an awkward silence for like a minute. The homeworks every week were honestly pretty time consuming and were graded pretty harshly. I'd recommend doing/attempting the homework honestly to make sure you secure that HW grade and prepare yourself for the tests. The tests were pretty hard and I often didn't have enough time to really finish at least for me (although the class averages seemed pretty decent). I think the class/final was curved significantly which ended up giving me a B (i'm not complaining tho). Don't be fooled into thinking this is an easy math class because its not calc or something. You'll have to put time in studying and doing hw for sure.
Professor Manning is a beast! Great explainer, super helpful (literally answered every question I had in the class, even if they weren't related to math at all), and genuinely cares about students. Also, he's an actual genius. He is insanely smart and just as kind. I would highly recommend taking this course with him (or really any course, to be honest). He's awesome. Godspeed Professor Manning.
Loved professor Manning’s 115B. I took it during the zoom era, so he actually recorded pre-lectures for each lecture. He used the 30ish minute pre-lectures to teach the material, and actual lecture was more to answer questions and give examples. And in general, the lectures were structured well, and the concepts were explained clearly. Everything was motivated nicely as well. As for hw, there’s a weekly problem set of about 8 questions, and they really helped improve my proof skills (I had only taken 115a before). Also, a lot of the hw questions were quite insightful since they introduce interesting topics not covered in class, and walk you through, using subquestions, a more complicated proof of some property or idea. The exams were also fair and interesting, though that might be because we were given 24 hrs and an entire week for the midterm and final, respectively. Overall, I highly recommend professor Manning.
As a person who enjoys mathematics and is trying to double major in math, I absolutely loved Manning's 32A class. He started off a bit quiet and shy, but by week 3 he was teaching concepts as clearly as any professor could. A lot of us felt that he spent an unnecessary amount of time on Kepler's laws but that was only because he was moving faster than the other lectures. This is my breakdown of different parts of the class:
Proofs of concepts such as curvature/tangent planes: extremely detailed, sometimes hard to follow
Examples: Manning covered a lot of important examples in class that showed us how to go about solving any problem. He didn't leave it to us to look into the textbook or online to see how a question is solved.
Tests: Both the midterms had a reasonable level of difficulty that you can expect from any math midterms and he curved up a tiny bit. The exam being a take-home final due to the Coronavirus situation was tougher and much longer than the midterms but was doable within the 24-hour window given to us.
Helpfulness: Although Mannings lectures can be daunting, he is an extremely nice person and always answers the smallest of questions in class and office hours and makes sure you understand the concepts.
Homework: The homework which is given weekly is helpful and never too difficult so if you are punctual and dedicate around 1.5 hours a week to the homework, you can secure full credit.
Lastly, if Joe Breen is TAing any of your math class, just take it blindly - you'll thank me later.
Professor Manning seemed quite nervous at the start of the quarter, as this was his first quarter teaching Math 32A. By nervous, I mean his voice was quite strained, he was stuttering and tripping over his words, and sounded like he was about to die from asphyxiation. However, by Week 5, he had built up marked confidence in his lectures and in fielding student questions. He also switched from a thin chalk to a thick chalk, which was extremely helpful, as students further than the first few rows were not able to even see the thin-chalk writing. He used red, blue, and orange thin chalk, which were substantially fainter than his standard thick white chalk.
Professor Manning emphasized and explained linearization very well; he also emphasized multivariable calculus as an extension of single-variable calculus by analyzing single-variable topics in a multivariable context.
Due to COVID-19, the final was a 24-hour take-home exam (agreed upon by the Math department), so there was no pressure for the final. I think there were too many questions on the first midterm (six instead of four or five). However, standard test-time-budgeting techniques can get you through.
Steven Gagniere is a decent TA. He is very humorous and explains the topics well. He occasionally expands on the material, which is greatly appreciated. From what I heard, though, Joseph Breen is even better!
I felt Prof. Manning put a lot of effort in really trying to explain the material well and make us get the intuition through visualizations, which I really appreciated. At times I felt he could have done a better job during lecture. For example, the first few weeks I could hardly read what was on the board because he was writing too lightly, and he would definitely benefit from a mic because it’s sometimes hard to hear him. Also, whenever he asks a question to the class, there would always be an awkward pause since nobody would answer him. The homeworks are all pre-written for you so you don’t need the textbook to do the homework, which I thought was nice. The tests were pretty challenging, but they were reasonable, and I felt like it was because he was actually trying to evaluate our true understanding of the material. Overall, he’s a pretty good teacher who tries to make the class engaging and challenging.
I think this class is pretty basic? I didn't do that well but generally, it's not stressful; it doesn't feel like theres an overwhelming amount of information at all... if you are a math major or generally smart I'm sure you will do great in this class. The midterms aren't exactly tricky, theres just maybe around 1 hard question, but its easy to lose points if you don't know how to prove something but the proofs aren't super tricky either. the Final had some more difficult proofs. Manning seems like a nice guy, his lectures sometimes feel a bit slow but if you can focus and follow along thats all you need. I dont know. this class felt basic but its not hard to do not good if that makes sense
The professor had good lectures that were helpful. Sometimes they weren't directly related to what we were tested on (e.g. he derived kepler's laws but he would never ask those kinds of things on a test). The exams were actually pretty straightforward. The problem is that it's kinda hard to finish his exams on time. Also, sometimes he uses pretty big/ugly numbers and expressions in his problems, which is kind of annoying. Overall good professor.
Manning is perhaps my favorite math professor as of now. As a person, he's really nice and makes sure you understand the topics being discussed and encourages people to ask questions if they are confused. He doesn't get annoyed at all when people ask questions, even if it's something that was covered multiple times in lecture. As a professor, he is very thorough when introducing new concepts. He spends a lot of time explaining why the concepts matter and slowly introduces them instead of just throwing it at the students all at once. The homework questions are mainly from the textbook, which was good because you could look up answers if you really needed to (I HIGHLY suggest against doing so because struggling in math is how you learn). Most homework assignments oftentimes introduced some new concept which felt frustrating at first, but turned out to be helpful since it helps you learn how to work with brand new ideas. Overall, a pretty good class and would definitely take his class again.