MATH 307: Introduction to Proof

Fall 2011, MTWF 1-1:50, 117 Fenton

Instructor: Sasha Polishchuk

Web page: http://pages.uoregon.edu/˜apolish/math307.html

Office: 207 Deady, phone 3465635

e-mail: apolish@uoregon.edu

Office Hours: Monday 2-3, Tuesday 2:30-3:30, or by appointment

Text: Mathematical Thinking. Problem solving and proofsby D’Angelo and West, 2nd edition (ISBN 0-13-014412-6)

Course content: The main goal of the course is to teach basics of the modern math-ematical language used in constructing mathematical statements and their proofs.The content will be quite diverse and will include some set theory, combinatoricsand number theory. Tentatively, we will be studying chapters 1-7 and 13 of thebook. The book’s style (typical for the higher level mathematical exposition) maypresent a challenge: learning to decipher it is one of the skills we are aiming at.More friendly introductions to some topics we’ll discuss can be found in “The heartof mathematics” by Berger and Starbird. Some number of copies of this book canbe found in Hilbert Space, the gathering lounge for math majors and friends on the1st floor of Deady Hall.

Homework: Homework assignments will be collected each Wednesday in class.Starting from the second week we’ll use Tuesday class as a discussion period (mostlydedicated to homework). The assignments will be posted on the class web page. Latehomework will not be accepted.

Midterm: One-hour test will be given in class during week 5.

Final exam: December 8, at 3:15pm, in the regular classroom.

Grading:homework 30%midterm 30%final exam 40%

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