[192-197] For the controls class itself, it’s mostly PowerPoint and he’s also posted them on the university page which makes it easier to study for the tests. It’s a lot of math in it so sometimes we do a problem and then he works through it in MATLAB and all of us have computers in the classroom. Then we are just trying to follow. He’s very good at MATLAB so he has a tendency to do it way too quickly than we can write in all the commands. So, we’re trying to write down what he’s doing in MATLAB but he’s going too fast to be able to do it. But the concept is good.
[199-204] Then for the lab that’s only once a week, three hours long. We usually start with a quiz and the quiz represents what we’ve been doing in the classroom, but they don’t coordinate it, so the quiz is about a topic we haven’t even done in the class. So, we have never been able to do the quiz. We always get the quiz and then we realize we cannot do it so then we just start working on the lab. So, we have to take home the quiz and turn it in another day. For the lab, we can get lab manuals where it can tell us from the beginning it’s very simple because they give us step by step.
[206-212] Like click here, click here, click here. The more we’re getting into it is just all this is what he wants. Just find it. And then it’s become difficult because we’re not used to using any software so much. It’s a software called Simulink and we also use MATLAB so that has been very challenging to do something without instructions. We always need help from the professor and it’s only one lab professor for the whole class. Sometimes the instructions don’t show us what to do about the issue that students are facing. Then it takes a long time for him to help every student so then he can see you’re not doing anything for a long time just because you’re stuck and can’t get help.
[218-222] Yeah. So, in lab since we’re using so much equipment in the lab you have to finish it while you’re there if you don’t want to come back on Friday afternoon. You can go to his office hours and get help so you’re basically just waiting for your turn for him to come. If he realizes that you’re running out of time compared to when class is going to end, and you’re not done he tries to help a lot and he’s helping get us through is goals quickly. Of course, he can finish in a much faster time so he can help us through that.