If the title of this course wasn't obvious enough for you, you are about to read a review on Geo 1HS3/Geog 1HA3. As with many of the geography courses for the 2008/2009 year, several are being merged into 1 class, removed completely, undergoing a name change or are just being...

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Originally Posted by lankan_4lif

How is Dr. Peace as a prof for GEOG 1HA3? As well, are the assignments for this course marked hard or does it depend on your TA?

I found Dr. Peace "spoonfeeds" you the material and a good speaker. He often talks to himself with the mic on. He doesn't post his notes online. If you want the goods, show up for class or get the notes from a friend.

The assignments are marked by your TA so it depends. My TA was tough, so it was difficult to please her, but it was possible to get high marks with a lot of effort.

Originally Posted by lankan_4lif

How difficult are the midterms and exams for this course?

They consist of T/F, fill in the blanks with no bank, M/C and short answer questions. The tests and exams were fair as long as you studied well. So the difficulty of these tests depends on you. I found them easy because they were straightforward questions from his notes and the book. Most of the questions were from his notes and there were 1-3 questions from the book that he did not discuss about.

I found this course difficult because it was very hard to stay interested in order to study. I did well (12) in GEOG because I worked my ass off even though most of the time I just wanted to kill myself or the course itself.

Does Dr. Mercier test out of his own notes or out of the textbook as well? How often was the textbook used for this class and how much does the prof (specifically Mercier) test out of the textbook?

Originally Posted by lankan_4lif

Does Dr. Mercier test out of his own notes or out of the textbook as well? How often was the textbook used for this class and how much does the prof (specifically Mercier) test out of the textbook?

He uses both. Most concepts are covered in notes but further detail is available in the text. I personally relied more on my notes than the textbook and it served me well.

alright so based on this review and 1hb3 (the geo math course), it seems this one is a bit easier..but is this course at all time consuming? I see labs sections for this course and that makes me worry a little..as a 2nd yr comp eng, i don't have a whole lotta time, so would you recommend this course for a busy 2nd year engineer? I dont want to run around hamilton making maps lol

Originally Posted by kenvin100

alright so based on this review and 1hb3 (the geo math course), it seems this one is a bit easier..but is this course at all time consuming? I see labs sections for this course and that makes me worry a little..as a 2nd yr comp eng, i don't have a whole lotta time, so would you recommend this course for a busy 2nd year engineer? I dont want to run around hamilton making maps lol

This course does require a lot of time if you want to do well. I wouldn't recommend it if you are extremely busy because you will have to go around Hamilton making maps as well as the multiple other assignments you will have to do.

I have Dr. Peace for geo 1ha3 and I was wondering, is it possible to do well only by reading his lecutre notes? There is a lot of content in the text compared to his lecture notes (his notes have no dates, names, while in the text it has a lot :\ ).

i know it's kind of early to worry about the tests, but i just have to know! Thanks!

the material is interesting and not hard but the workload is considerable. plan ahead and reserve material. only one of the "labs" is actually lab (it's work done in map archive). everything else is tutorial on how the assignments should be done. it's ton's of writing (8-15 pages every two weeks plus maps etc.). if you are engineering student, don't go for this as elective, pick econ (micro and macro).

I find people make this course sound easier than it is.

Two of the papers are roughly 10 pages long, and if you're picky about your mark (which you should be) you're going to want to be EXTREMELY careful of who you pick for your groups. Some TAs let you pick, some don't (my TA told us that, at least). The group assignments are worth 15% of your mark and there are two of them. They're really time-consuming if you want to do well, and if you're not comfortable with 30% of your mark being reliant on others' work ethic and knowledge, I'd really look into it before you take this class. I liked it and everything and did well, but that wasn't without staying up a couple nights to work on my group project after 2 of the members decided not to send their parts...

The midterm and exam aren't EASY really, but if you understand the material and go to class you're pretty much fine. Dr. Mercier and Dr. Peace are awesome professors in my opinion, but a lot of people in my labs complained about not knowing a lot of the answers on the midterm because they studied solely from the textbook. You HAVE to go to lectures, or else you're going to be totally lost.

Also, not showing up to labs (although it won't be entirely detrimental to your lab mark, since you somehow get an additional 1% added to your overall grade if you "only" miss 3 labs) is a no-no. You may not DO a lot in labs, but the TAs explain your upcoming assignments in those labs, and if you miss them you'd be completely lost and would have to ask someone to explain it - there's a lot of information to know pre-assignment, so it'd be difficult to do well if you skipped labs.

As long as you go to class ALL the time and get notes of off someone if you miss one, go to every lab (you get 3% added onto your mark if you miss 0 or 1 lab), and read through the textbook when the professor (regardless of which one it is) tells you, you'd be totally fine.

All of this information is essentially the same for 1HB3, since they're formatted the exact same way.

Does anyone know how Prof Legare is?? He is teaching this course in the summer. And also if anyone has taken this course in the summer, is the breakdown of the course pretty much the same as during the school year?

Is there a lot of writing for this course? i dont like essays >:(

There is A LOT of writing! There are 2, 10-page essays, and a regular essay EVERY WEEK! It's MADNESS! I mean, they switched from the faculty of socsci to science, they should make it a freaking science course for god's sake, without and essay every week :| It was just crazy, to me.

I dropped this course because I was sick, had a doctor's note extending for X number of days, and I handed in my assignment to Mercier the last day covered on the note and he was like this is no excuse, WHEN I HAD A DOCTOR'S NOTE and failed me. I was like this is ridiculous, and that was 5% of my mark gone there, with and assignment every week, I wasn't ready to put up with it. Mercier also requires that you show up for tutorials on time, like on the dot, and if you're one minute late you don't get the marks for that tutorial (attendance counts).

Yes, there is quite a bit of writing for this course. Assignment 1 was a map assignment done in Mills Library. Assignment 2 you were assigned an article and you had to write a 2 pg critique and 2 pg precis (summary) of the aclrtie. Assignment 3 you had to write about 8-10 pgs on a topic you chose from a list of topics your TA provides you with. This assignment requires quite a bit of time to do well on and you need to gather articles and such as it was a research paper. Assignments 1-3 were done individually.

Assignment 4 was done in pairs and you were given a list of two types of restaurants and you pick one from each list. You and your partner would go out to the restaurant such as Wendys and Boston Pizza and do field work. You would basically study the physical and social structures and environments of both the places and take 2 sets of field notes and sketch rough maps of the places. Then you have to write up a report which is about 7-8 pages long.

Assignment 5 was done in groups of 4-5 people and you had to design a tour guide book for 10 places around Hamilton and this assignment of the 5 was the most time consuming by far. The weights of the 5 assignments are as follows: 5%, 5%, 10%, 15% and 15%.

The midterm was 15% and the final was 30%. I had Dr. Mercier and I found him to be a really effective lecturer and he even dropped hints about the final exam. I would strongly recommend going to lectures as most of the material on the midterm and final is from the lectures. A few select questions on both the midterm and final wre from the textbook and lab material but just skimming each chapter is recommended, you do not need to make detailed notes from the textbook. As well, pay attention to the lab material as well seuch as mapping and videos as they were part of the short answers on the midterm and final exam. The final exam was very easy as well but most of it was on the lecture material, so if you put the time in to study, you should do well.

Overall, for an elective course, I found the assignments to be quite time consuming but not too bad overall depending on how well your group members are and your writing skills. If you work at it, a double digit grade is easily attainable. Also note, if you attend all your labs or miss up to 3 I believe you can earn up to a maximum of 3% bonus added to your final mark at the end of the course. 3% is added to your final mark if you miss none of the 10 labs. The lab sections are more like tutorials where you are assigned the five assignments as well there are also participation marks awarded for such things as a health care debate and completing mini assignments.

Originally Posted by resh.jyoti

There is A LOT of writing! There are 2, 10-page essays, and a regular essay EVERY WEEK! It's MADNESS! I mean, they switched from the faculty of socsci to science, they should make it a freaking science course for god's sake, without and essay every week :| It was just crazy, to me.

I dropped this course because I was sick, had a doctor's note extending for X number of days, and I handed in my assignment to Mercier the last day covered on the note and he was like this is no excuse, WHEN I HAD A DOCTOR'S NOTE and failed me. I was like this is ridiculous, and that was 5% of my mark gone there, with and assignment every week, I wasn't ready to put up with it. Mercier also requires that you show up for tutorials on time, like on the dot, and if you're one minute late you don't get the marks for that tutorial (attendance counts).

I completely agree with you about how Mercier is so much picky about everyting when his own way of doing things are not by far better. When my partner's computer chrased, he did not give us extra time.

The TA tells you to do "things" for the assignemt and if its done that way, you are supposed to get a good mark. This is not really true b/c the ta's are really hiding the marking scheme(atleast 30-40% of the requirements). One of my group member was friends with a ta and was able to score good on an assignemt 15 % of final mark b/c the little things that weren't told were actually very important. This is kinda unfair for those who actually put time an effort in work and end up scoring less for a project 15% of final mark.

I highly suggest to people who don't need to take this course not to take it. If you end up with a crappy ta like i did, despite working hard(hours every week in which you have assignemnts) you could end up scoring pretty bad on the assignents which are 50% of your final mark, where 30%(in group) you really have no contol over. Tests/exam are somewhat easy but they are worth not much. (45%)

I have had much better experience with Economics as elective 1B03 or 1BB3, where you can earn a mark by putting in effort v/s here where getting mark is unfair ...

This course is really boring, and the professor keeps getting interrupted by unrelated questions/discussions.

this class is too much work .. don't take it unless u are going into geog i regret taking it so muchh work and essays holy

but dr.peace is awesome