Jump to Daily Work: [Homeworks] [Questions on Readings] [In-class Exercises] [Instructor-led Class] [Student-led Discussion]
Jump to Open-Ended Project: [Initial Presentation] [Checkpoint 1] [Checkpoint 2] [Final Presentation] [Final Report]
Homeworks
These are intended to build your intuition and experience in implementing real inference algorithms on toy problems.
Open-Ended Project
You will spend about 2 months on a self-designed research project. To keep you on track, we have established several specific checkpoints at which you will turn in preliminary reports that build on each other and will eventually evolve into a final report and final presentation.
Brainstorming Your Project Idea
For inspiration, you might consider:
- Skimming the Project Ideas discussion posts on Piazza
- Browsing papers from recent tutorials or workshops
- Feel free to stop by Office Hours to brainstorm with your instructor or TA
Critical Questions on Readings
Students are expected to regularly submit questions about assigned readings that indicate their strong preparation for constructive academic discussion.
At least once per week of class, each student is expected to post two questions to Piazza that they wish to discuss in that class related to the assigned reading. At least one question should engage in high-level synthesis, and not just be a factual question trying to clarify a detail of the paper's presented method or procedures.
Evaluation:
These comments will be evaluated on a "sufficient"/"insufficient" binary grading basis. If your comments show low-effort or poor understanding, it will not count toward your required number of comments.
Procedural notes:
- Questions are due before 9am on the day of the assigned reading. (Gives your instructor team time to prepare to lead class that day).
- When posting your comments, reply to the Piazza thread created by the instructor for that particular reading, usually named something like "Thu 09/26 Questions for discussion"
- You should AVOID reading other comments before posting your own. Do your own work!
- After you post, feel free to engage in responding to other students
In-Class Pop-up Exercises
To encourage in-class participation and attendance, at 4 random classes throughout the semester, we will include a brief "pop-up exercises" worksheet segment where students need to work through a key idea of that day's assigned reading, requiring roughly 20 minutes of work or less.
Students will turn in individual worksheets. These will be graded on an unsatisfactory/satisfactory/excellent basis (corresponding to grades of D/B/A+).
Students who miss class will not be able to make up that assignment. Virtual participation will also not count toward completion of this in-person activity.
To form an overall grade for pop-up exercises, we will take the 3 highest scores of the semester (dropping the 4th one). This effectively means each student will be allowed to skip 1 pop-up exercise segment without penalty, as we know there are many valid reasons to occasionally miss class.
Instructor-led Class
In each typical class meeting, we will discuss a specific paper or set of papers, as posted on this website's schedule page. All students should expect to carefully read the assigned paper before class and be an active participant in the discussion.
For the first month or so, the instructor will lead each class, with some hands-on activities and class discussion.
Template for instructor-led classes:
- 00-05 min: Announcements & short overview of the paper by your instructor
- What is the big idea? Why is this exciting?
- How does this connect to the other optional readings and the broader ideas of the course?
- 05-35 min: Short presentation by instructor
- key technical contribution (model, algorithm, etc.)
- key experimental result
- limitation or weakness of the method
- limitation or weakness of the experimental design
- 35-65: Small group exercise/discussion time
- Students discuss key questions provided by instructors and students
- 65-75: Regroup and Takeaways
- Each group reports back to larger class
- Summary of takeaway messages
Student-led Class Discussions
Starting in mid-October, the format will transition to one where students lead most classwork. Each student will, as part of their project team, be a discussion leader for one class.
Template for student-run classes:
- 00-05 min: Announcements & short overview of the paper by your instructor
- What is the big idea? Why is this exciting?
- How does this connect to the broader ideas of the course?
- 05-25 min: Short presentation by that day's student discussion leaders
- Presenters can use any format (whiteboard, slides, etc)
- The presentation should cover at least one of each:
- key technical contribution (model, algorithm, etc.)
- key experimental result
- limitation or weakness of the method
- limitation or weakness of the experimental design
- 25-75: Exercises or Group work time
- Student teams can work on their projects
- Instructor will be available for detailed help / debugging
Discussion leader responsibilities:
- Work cooperatively with co-leaders as a team
- Read the paper well in advance of the assigned date
- Meet with instructor as a team during office hours (or, in rare cases, by appointment) at least 2 days before the scheduled class to discuss strategy
- Prepare ~20 min presentation of key ideas
- Prepare questions for students