Course Lingo - Labs, Core, Tutorial, EOW

What are CORE, LAB, and TUTORIALS?

CORE sections are your lectures. These are the main classes that you are familiar with... a professor will be at the front of the room giving a lecture about certain course material. You sit in a 'lecture hall' which is basically a very large classroom that can hold around 50-150 students at once depending on how big the classes are. Lectures are usually larger and there are a lot less opportunity to ask questions, since the professor is doing a presentation and you are taking notes on your laptop or in a paper notebook (whichever you prefer). Some professors will interact with the class and ask if there are any questions, where you can put up your hand and ask the question, or you can talk to the professor privately after the lecture is over and ask a question 1-on-1 if the professor has available time (sometimes they need to quickly leave the room to go to their next lecture, etc). Lectures are usually held once or twice a week and last one or two hours.

LABS are for courses that require use of a room to conduct experiments. These are usually only in courses such as those in Engineering and Sciences.

TUTORIALS are usually once per week and are basically your chance to ask questions and learn the material for the course on a more personal basis in a smaller classroom setting. You will have a Tutorial Assistant (TA) who is usually a upper year student in their third or fourth year that has already taken the class you are taking and knows the material well. The TA will go over the material that the professor taught in the lecture to make sure everyone understands it, they may go over complimentary material in the textbook that adds to the lecture material, and they also may do quizzes with you and test your knowledge of the material. TAs are also very open to questions, so if you don't understand something... ASK! These Tutorial classes usually last about an hour in length. TAs also have OFFICE HOURS during the week, which is a time during the week where you can visit your TA in their office and have a chance to ask questions and get more 1-on-1 personalized assistance on topics you may need help with or don't understand. Utilize this time! TAs are required to be in their office during those hours, and sometimes students don't come to ask questions so they aren't maximizing the opportunity to get help!

SOME OTHER LINGO TO KNOW:

EOW = Every Other Week, meaning that the class/lab/tutorial will be on alternating weeks. One week you'll have it, the next week you won't. This allows for you to switch between classes and labs, since some courses you'll go to class one week, then the next week go to lab.

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All courses have COURSE CODES (example: ENGLISH 1A03). The subject is first, followed by a number, a letter, and a number. The 1 usually represents the term that the course is taken in, and the number at the end is how many UNITS that course is worth. So ENGLISH 1A03 would be taken in Term 1 and is worth 3 UNITS. Again, units add up to a total which is indicated in the Undergraduate Calendar.

^^ The italicized part makes no sense lol

Originally Posted by yoni

All courses have COURSE CODES (example: ENGLISH 1A03). The subject is first, followed by a number, a letter, and a number. The 1 usually represents the term that the course is taken in, and the number at the end is how many UNITS that course is worth. So ENGLISH 1A03 would be taken in Term 1 and is worth 3 UNITS. Again, units add up to a total which is indicated in the Undergraduate Calendar.

^^ The italicized part makes no sense lol

yeah that's wrong...

I'm a second year (now) and this helped me LOL. thanks Chad!!

Originally Posted by sinnersdrown

yeah that's wrong...

Which is why the poster said that the italicized part makes no sense . Unless I interpreted something wrong..

Originally Posted by herBs

Which is why the poster said that the italicized part makes no sense . Unless I interpreted something wrong..

I was just agreeing with the poster lol

Thanks for pointing that out guys, I have removed that part to avoid causing confusion. Sometimes you'll have courses that build on each other, so you'll see 1A and 1B with similar titles, you'd want to take 1A in term 1, and 1B in term 2. But to avoid confusion I've left it out, since sometimes students have to take them in whatever order is available to them in their timetable, and it's not mandatory to do so unless the course calendar actually says that the 1A03 course is required before taking the other.

Originally Posted by drpatel

I'm a second year (now) and this helped me LOL. thanks Chad!!

Haha always glad to help!