Foundations of Information Science

Throughout the semester (approximately once a week, or slightly less often) I will give you “probe” questions to answer online before coming to class. These questions will “probe” your understanding of the material you’ve just read. They serve 2 purposes:

1. They show me that you’ve done the reading, and
2. they highlight areas that you may be having trouble with, so I can spend more time on them in class.

Because the probes will involve concepts that we have not yet discussed, you will be graded mainly on the level of effort you put into trying to answer, rather than the correctness of your answer (and some questions may not have a clear correct answer anyway). So:

• If you don’t answer the probe at all, you get zero points.
• If you try to answer the probe, but make no reference to the readings or anything else we’ve covered in class, you get one point.
• If you answer the probe and refer to concepts from the readings or from class, but use them incorrectly or don’t fully answer the question, you get two points.
• If you answer the probe completely and correctly, making reference to the readings, class notes, or outside materials, you get the full three points.

The questions will be posted 24 hours before they are due, and they will be due at 7AM, 5.5 hours before we meet.

Probe for September 11.

Probe for September 18.

Midterm covering the first unit on information organization.

Probe for November 13.