Meeting
My new Masters' student is an assiduous worker - but I knew that already.
After our talk on Tuesday, I sent her a .pdf of Taxonomy I, telling her to read Sections 1 and 2. On Wednesday, she e-mailed me about an unfamiliar term, asking for its definition. (It's most commonly used in another branch of mathematics, and its definition there is complicated. I use it in an idiosyncratic but natural way, and I don't think any experienced mathematician would have had any trouble, but of course she isn't one. She did due diligence by looking it up, was confused, and asked for explanation.) When we met again on Friday, she had printed out Sections 1 and 2 and copiously annotated them. We spent half an hour going over her questions about the material, and then another half talking about group representation theory. (That's a humongous topic, but it provides some tools that I've found useful, so I'm just going to teach her that much.)
At the end of the Friday talk, I gave her some simple exercises to work; they're designed to help her gain some feel for the machinery I've developed. She should have no trouble with them. I'm very pleased so far.
After our talk on Tuesday, I sent her a .pdf of Taxonomy I, telling her to read Sections 1 and 2. On Wednesday, she e-mailed me about an unfamiliar term, asking for its definition. (It's most commonly used in another branch of mathematics, and its definition there is complicated. I use it in an idiosyncratic but natural way, and I don't think any experienced mathematician would have had any trouble, but of course she isn't one. She did due diligence by looking it up, was confused, and asked for explanation.) When we met again on Friday, she had printed out Sections 1 and 2 and copiously annotated them. We spent half an hour going over her questions about the material, and then another half talking about group representation theory. (That's a humongous topic, but it provides some tools that I've found useful, so I'm just going to teach her that much.)
At the end of the Friday talk, I gave her some simple exercises to work; they're designed to help her gain some feel for the machinery I've developed. She should have no trouble with them. I'm very pleased so far.