Session 2: Time

Using Google Calendar

Set up your Google Calendars by

1. adding all 8 classes, and
2. de-activating your free blocks

The list of class Google Calendars are as follows:

• block A
• block B
• block C
• block D
• block E
• block F
• block G
• block H

Then there are general calendars:

• College Calendar
• Assessment: all internal and IB assessments and deadlines
• EOTC
• Wellbeing
• University guidance

After adding them, change the colors of the calendars. Make sure each can be easily seen.

Explore the four different calendar views (week, day, month, schedule).

How many block D slots are there in the whole year? (The actual number of classes is about three-quarter this number.)

Create an event called 🍅 Pomodoro 1: Chem in your personal schedule. Make it 30 minutes long. This can be for any time; you will move it in the next Puzzle.

Confession time 😯! I use Google Calendars as a reference, but I prefer to do all my central planning on paper 📝. Why would Jon do that? (I mean, besides being old as the dinosaurs🦕?) What are the pros and cons of using paper vs digital planners?

The Pomodoro Method 🍅

The classic Pomodoro Method uses a kitchen timer, and concentrate work into 25 minutes, followed by 5 minutes of rest. Then you repeat.

Hey! That's 30 minutes, and you have already created a 30 minute event in your calendar! What a surprise. Move the 🍅 Pomodoro 1: Chem event to an hour that you are free.

Rename the event to 🍅 Pomodoro 1: Chem Session 2 HW to show what you will be doing. To save time in the future, you may also want to add relevant links in the description of the event.

Add a second Pomodoro immediately following the first one. This creates a 1 hour block for doing the chem homework today (you will not need it).

On your phone, install a timer app that supports the Pomodoro method. I use one called MultiTimer (iOS). You can always try something else later.

Demonstration

Optimal durations of work-rest will be different for different kinds of task, and your personal situation. My routine focus time is 35 minute, but this goes down when I am stressed.

Once I get going, I sometimes get in a flow. In these rare, glorious occasions, I ignore the 🍅 and ride the flow.

Write down your experiences and modificiations. You will forget. To forget is human.

Units: Conversions and Habits

Convert 10 minutes to seconds.

Use the sliders below to create eight questions of increasing difficulty.

• minutes
• hours
• days
• weeks
• milliseconds

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Aim to do each within 20 seconds. You can use calculators to handle the arithmetic.

If you get some wrong, it is probably because you skipped steps.

Essential Habit 1

Do this on paper.

Essential Habit 2

Break each conversion into steps. Use a conversion factor to change hour to minutes, then convert minutes to seconds. You trade speed for accuracy, and it is a good trade. There is no prize for the first to be wrong.

Essential Habit 3

Write out all units explicitly. Cross out units. What remains should be "sec". If it is not, something is wrong with your set up.

Sometimes we even do the calculations without the numbers, just with units, to make sure that the calculations would work out. This is called a Dimensional Analysis.

Good habits usually look trivial at the beginning. However, they make hard things easy, and impossible things possible.

25% of you will forget about the value of good habit before it becomes a habit. When you work in a group, and you notice your friends skipping steps, point it out to them gently but firmly. Be one another's angels 😇.

S.I. Prefix and the Scientific Notation

Invent and complete eight problems in your notes.

Convert 10 ms to seconds.

Use the sliders below to create your own questions.

• ms
• µs
• ns
• ps
• fs

无数据

Aim to do each within 20 seconds. You can use calculators to handle the arithmetic.

Unlike with minutes and hours, here you have little intuition, and the habits above becomes essential.

Let's repeat it: If you get some wrong, it is probably because you skipped steps.

Essential Habit 1

Do this on paper.

Essential Habit 2

Break each conversion into steps. Use a conversion factor to change hour to minutes, then convert minutes to seconds. You trade speed for accuracy, and it is a good trade. There is no prize for the first to be wrong.

Essential Habit 3

Write out all units explicitly. Cross out units. What remains should be "sec". If it is not, something is wrong with your set up.

😡😡😡

😡: YOU DIDN'T GIVE US AN ANSWER CHECKING BOX!!1!!!1!

😂: How did that affect your learning?

😡: RaarRRARAR!!!1!!!!

😂: Remember how important it is to get feedback, so you know you are on the right track. NEVER JUST DO STUFF. Always make sure you get feedback so you can learn from it.

😡: RaarRRARAR!!!1!!!!

😂: Ok ok... how about we teach you how to build this answer checker?

Google Sheets: Formula

You already have the skills from Spreadsheet 101; here you will use it to create your own Answer Checker for the previous puzzle. A finished example is shown above.

1. Create a new Google Sheet in an appropriate folder. Give it an appropriate name.
2. Set column A to be the time input.
3. Cell A2 will be the only numerical input;
4. Write formula in A3:A6 so they reflect the value of A2.
5. Set column B to be the units; type ms, ..., fs in B2:B6.
6. Set column C to be the conversion. Type the conversion factors in C2:C6. Use scientific notation.
7. Set column D to be the calculated result.
8. Write the appropriate formula in D2, then auto-fill the rest.
9. Use your newly-developed calculator to check your own answers.

---

The challenge: Can you modify this to convert between any pair of units, for example, from fs to ns? Note that this would require using advanced spreadsheet functions that we will NOT teach in this course.

Here is the solution --- pause the video when the video got your unstuck, and try to get through as much as you can independently.

You can dissect the completed spreadsheet here.

Homework

No homework today! 🙃

😡: But, but, my two Pomodoro 🍅 events... 😂: We said "you won't need it", no?

Before next session, however, you need to watch a video on getting physically organized, and then do some shopping at a stationary shop. Maybe you want to edit and make one 🍅 a shopping event instead?

Here is your shopping list:

1. colored pens
   • Essential: (0) a black pen (1) a red pen and (2) a green pen
     • Luxury: Pigment liner pens (e.g., Staedler, micron, pigma). These are water- and chemical-proof once they dry. 0.3 mm is the right size for the notebook.
     • Super-luxury: an additional black/blue Frixion pen. The ink in Frixion pens are heat-sensitive, so when there is friction the marks becomes colorless. In other words, erasable ballpoint pens.
   • Nice to have: (3) purple, (4) yellow
   • Luxury: (5) a pack of highlighters of different colors
     • (5b) Super-luxury: Zebra Mildliner pack of 5 colors
2. a small (passport-sized) notebook. Small enough that you can carry in your pocket all the time. This will be your TODO list / thought-catcher.
   • I got mine from Muji 無印良品.
3. colored paperclips
4. Sticky notes (Post-Its)
5. 1" (2.5 cm) A4 folder to hold your current chemistry notes.
   • luxury: dividers (I just use paperclips)
   • future-proof: an additional two 3" binders. If you are organized and diligent, you will work through about 1500 pages of practices.
6. (optional) a deck of playing cards
7. (optional) a pencil case to hold it all together (or rubberbands).