| Using multiple colors of chalk is a simple thing, but by doing so, Professor Blair makes graphs easy to read. Also, having the lecture slides available before class is helpful. |
| Instructor was great, he knew and prepared the material very well and portrayed it to the class very simply. The workload is manageable and the tests were of a very balanced difficulty. Very good class overall. |
| Ryan Blair is easily the best math professor I have had at Penn out of the four semesters of math I have taken. He is incredibly friendly, charismatic, clear, and willing to slow down to explain difficult concepts. His class organization is wonderful and I applaud his use of slides that are accessible after class. Blair made a previously painful subject matter at Penn quite manageable and bearable. Math 240 itself is kind of a mix subject matter wise. Half of it is incredibly bland and annoying, and the other half (linear algebra) is intuitive and borderline fun. It's the easiest math course out of those I have taken so far too, but much of that is thanks to Blair. He is the best. |
| Blair is excellent at presenting the material clearly. I had to withdraw from math last semester with a different professor, but I'm happy to have had Blair and done way better. |
| Ryan Blair is the star of the mathematics department. He is a phenomenal instructor and highly knowledgeable and interested in his students' performance and understanding. i really did not like the class, but it was required, and Dr. Blair made it worthwhile. |
| Professor Blair is great. He's personable, easy to understand, gives time for people to take notes, is funny, and can actually get students to ANSWER QUESTIONS. That is a great feat in and of itself. I really have no qualms about his class. |
| Dr. Blair is an amazing teacher and also person. He was always willing to help and was extremely great at communicating the subject material. |
| Lectures very very helpful. Homework though very tedious and take too much time |
| One of the best math teachers I have ever had. |
| I think most other students in the class agree that Dr. Blair explained difficult concepts in a way that we could understand and appreciated his focus on deeper understanding (as opposed to rote computation of easy to understand concepts). As a result of the way Dr. Blair taught the course, I feel significantly more confident in my understanding of the math 240 course material and ability to retain that understanding. Dr. Blair explained things slowly and took any questions that we may have had in the middle of lecture when we had those questions, making his lectures easier to follow than other math lectures at Penn.
I have already recommended to students planning to take Math 240 to take it with Dr. Blair because of the way he explains things. |
| n/a |
| Professor Blair was extremely effective at communicating the information clearly, and he made concepts much easier to understand. I thought the homework assignments were very fair in quantity and difficulty. My only complaint was the small number of exams in the class, because we only had two midterms and a final, so there was very little room for error. |
| I wish the course itself focused more on concepts and less on "plugging and chugging."
Dr. Blair is a fantastic professor! His lectures are very clear, engaging, and easy to follow. He is also very approachable outside of class. |
| Blair's teaching is excellent and his course structure is also really well laid out. The only problem I had was not keeping up with course material. If I did, I would not have a problem with the course. |
| Ryan Blair is an excellent professor. He speaks very clearly. His power point slides supplement his lecture materials and examples very well.
The text book for this course, Advanced Engineering Mathematics, is terrible. Reading the sections in the book is impossible and doesn't teach me anything. |
| Prof. Blair was very good at teaching through examples mainly. He made lectures enjoyable and I rarely needed to go over the material afterwards to understand it. The course didn't follow a logical pattern though as it started with the most complicated concepts (integrals for 3D surfaces) and finished with straightforward linear algebra. Overall the course could be structured differently but in any way it can be called a tough course, with most of the material learnt by repetition through lengthy homework assignments. |
| Professor Blair was definitely one of the best math teachers I've had here. He was really helpful outside of class, and he used lots of examples in class to really communicate the material. |
| This course was structured well. |
| Timing of homeworks and quizzes is a bit odd. It would be better to have the homework due before we are quizzed on the associated material in recitation (most of what I learned was from doing the homework, not from attending lecture). |
| Best math instructor ever. |
| Ryan Blair is the BEST professor I have ever had! |
| Professor Blair is an absolutely fantastic teacher. Probably one of the best math teachers I'll ever have. He taught everything so clearly and in such a concise way that everything made perfect sense. I liked the way he always asked us questions to ensure that we were learning. He was always available for questions, and was very easy-going. He was so good that I wish he was teaching MATH 241 next semester so I could have him again!
At first I hated having mandatory homework assignments, but now I'm so thankful we did, since it forced me to constantly keep up with the class, making my learning very effective. |
| Very enjoyable; professor was an excellent lecturer. |
| Ryan Blair is an outstanding math professor. He makes even the most obscure mathematical concepts very clear and can make anything sound interesting. It is obvious that his love for math carries over into his teaching style, and because of him, I am continuing onward with math here at Penn. |
| Blair is amazing. He has a really loud and attractive voice making it easy to pay attention. My one aversion is that the class content is so easy that everyone does really well making it difficult to know where you stand in the class. Also it is really stupid that homework is graded because you will never know if you are doing the problems correctly. I suggest giving us the answers to the homework and making exams worth more or something because otherwise we would not know how to do the problems. |
| Dr. Blair is the best professor I've had so far at Penn. He is one of the friendliest and most approachable professors I know, and he's always willing to help out a student who is confused about a concept with a smile on his face. (Dr. Blair's face at first, and the student's as well after Dr. Blair is done helping him/her out.) He also builds a great rapport with his students, and everyone really seems to love him. All around a very nice guy. |
| Ryan Blair is an amazing math professor. He explains concepts so clearly and goes over several examples, ensuring that his students understand the material, without explaining so much that the class gets bored. He is a great lecturer and even though it is a large class he encourages class participation. The material would not be very interesting to a non-major. |
| Dr. Blair was an excellent professor. The homework was excessive though; I would have preferred optional homework as is done in other courses. Aside from easing the burden, it allows those with initiative to get ahead, while causing the curves to be more manageable. |
| Prof. Blair is an excellent teacher. |
| Blair is the best professor I have had on this campus. His organization and energy level keeps students interested, awake, and eager to come to class each day. His office hours are extremely helpful, because of the personal attention he gives to your questions and the challenges he poses in order to advance your understanding of the course material. It is apparent why he is a professor, he genuinely cares about each students understanding and development in the class. |
| Dr. Blair was extremely good at communicating the material. He was always well-prepared with his powerpoints. Initially I was resistant to the idea of conducting a math class based on powerpoint presentations, but Dr. Blair pulled it off very well.
His tests were fair, although occasionally somewhat difficult. Homework assignments were too long and tedious, and often took hours for no educational reason (tedious algebra characterizes this course). However, such is the nature of Math 240, and does not reflect on Dr. Blair's teaching style.
Dr. Blair made himself available, and even conducted review sessions before the second midterm and the final exam. He was always enthusiastic when responding to questions, and had a generally friendly and commanding demeanor while teaching the class. Lectures were always well-attended.
The textbook for the course is of miserable quality, and is of no use for learning the material.
The only critique I have of Dr. Blair is that his powerpoints often included long definitions that were hard to copy down, and Dr. Blair sometimes did not give us enough time to copy these into our notes. This is a minor issue. |
| Professor Blair is by far the best math professor I have ever had. He's actually one of the best professors/teachers I've had thus far. He explains things clearly and he keeps the students interested. His exams and quizzes are fair. He's a little slow with email responses but he's definitely willing and able to help any student. If it wasn't for his encouragement and help, I would have dropped the class. I wish he taught more math classes. |
| Great guy and great professor. |
| Blair was great. I have never been so engaged in a math class. He is very good at communicating material. However, I thought the textbook was incredibly unhelpful. |
| I really enjoy Professor Blair's meticulous and clear approach to teaching. He has made learning the concepts in MATH 240 really easy by breaking it down into smaller pieces. |