Smadar Naoz
Department of Physics
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4.3
Overall Rating
Based on 3 Users
Easiness 4.0 / 5 How easy the class is, 1 being extremely difficult and 5 being easy peasy.
Clarity 4.0 / 5 How clear the class is, 1 being extremely unclear and 5 being very clear.
Workload 4.3 / 5 How much workload the class is, 1 being extremely heavy and 5 being extremely light.
Helpfulness 4.7 / 5 How helpful the class is, 1 being not helpful at all and 5 being extremely helpful.

TOP TAGS

  • Participation Matters
  • Gives Extra Credit
  • Engaging Lectures
  • Would Take Again
GRADE DISTRIBUTIONS
29.0%
24.2%
19.3%
14.5%
9.7%
4.8%
0.0%
A+
A
A-
B+
B
B-
C+
C
C-
D+
D
D-
F

Grade distributions are collected using data from the UCLA Registrar’s Office.

44.4%
37.0%
29.6%
22.2%
14.8%
7.4%
0.0%
A+
A
A-
B+
B
B-
C+
C
C-
D+
D
D-
F

Grade distributions are collected using data from the UCLA Registrar’s Office.

ENROLLMENT DISTRIBUTIONS
Clear marks

Sorry, no enrollment data is available.

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Reviews (3)

1 of 1
1 of 1
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Quarter: Spring 2025
Grade: A+
Verified Reviewer This user is a verified UCLA student/alum.
June 19, 2025

Prof. Naoz is one of the most kind and caring professor I had at UCLA! She is always super engaging and fun (she is so fashionable too :D). You can tell she really cares about her students (both as human beings and as learners). I love how she is always excited and teaches us cool things to relate the concepts we learn in class to things that are actually relevant in real life! As someone whose primary major is not Physics, she really inspires me to want to pursue Physics more seriously (never once in my life had I considered pursuing Physics PhD after grad, but I guess here we are).

Helpful?

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Quarter: Spring 2025
Grade: A
Verified Reviewer This user is a verified UCLA student/alum.
June 18, 2025

I have heard only positive things about Dr. Naoz, so I came into the course very excited to have her as my professor. She is a very inspirational person. From her cheering us on for every exam and offering extra credit to citing studies on how education can better benefit students, it is clear she genuinely cares about teaching as well as her students.
However, I genuinely struggled to learn in this class. The exams were often worded in ways that were extremely confusing to me, and some questions had no indication that you needed to solve a problem a certain way or show work in a specific way. The exams themselves were easy conceptually and math-wise, but I just struggled with the wording. I also struggled to follow her lectures because of how disjointed they could be. She frequently made mistakes, would misspell words, and backtrack to the point where there were times I just stopped taking notes.
For better or worse, Dr. Naoz puts a lot of emphasis on astro-related concepts. Also, the content of the class is very skewed. You barely learn anything after week 7. If you come in with a strong foundation of Lagrangians, Hamiltonians, and special relativity, this class should be quite easy for you.
Overall, the class was relatively easy, but the lectures were a bit difficult to follow. It's doable to teach yourself from the textbook.

Helpful?

0 0 Please log in to provide feedback.
Quarter: Spring 2025
Grade: A-
Verified Reviewer This user is a verified UCLA student/alum.
June 7, 2025

Prof. Naoz is the GOAT. I didn't know what to expect for Physics 105B judging from my humdrum 105A experience with another professor, but she completely changed my perception of an ideal physics class and actually showed what this physics is used for.

Firstly, she is a very engaging lecturer who actively encourages participation, learning, work, and collaboration from us. Not in a forceful or demanding way, but actually a genuine teacher who strategically gets people involved with multitudes of extra credit opportunities, participation quizzes without punishing answers, and rewards people for paying attention and correcting her mistakes by throwing chocolates. She occasionally cracks funny jokes, lots of pop culture references (which are getting stale, much to her chagrin), most importantly, cares about her students' learning. Heck, she cites studies about the best ways of teaching students and accommodates for peoples' conflicting midterms by extending homework deadlines! Furthermore, she oozes with passion for physics, as she gives presentations showing the applications of the physic we are covering and often relates it to astrophysics, which is her main field of study (and also totally my thing). Her class is so lively with these things, it's so much more different that any other (upper) physics class I had. I imagine Naoz has spent an ungodly amount of time and effort into meticulously planning how she would teach this class. She has been teaching this class for multiple years and apparently this quarter is the last time she would do that, so god fricking damn please give her an award and let her keep teaching 105A and 105B!

Naoz's homework and example problems are quite challenging and I personally had to rely on office hours to figure these out. Naoz's office hours for homework help and concept clarifications are helpful; instead of straight up giving the answer, she really makes you learn by making you do the work yourself while nudging you along the way. I do wish she offered more office hours or extended them, because I found her more helpful than the TA. All of these did help prepare me for her exams, which turn out quite straightforward compared to her homework; she has even said that herself, just to eliminate any exam stress.

Helpful?

0 0 Please log in to provide feedback.
Verified Reviewer This user is a verified UCLA student/alum.
Quarter: Spring 2025
Grade: A+
June 19, 2025

Prof. Naoz is one of the most kind and caring professor I had at UCLA! She is always super engaging and fun (she is so fashionable too :D). You can tell she really cares about her students (both as human beings and as learners). I love how she is always excited and teaches us cool things to relate the concepts we learn in class to things that are actually relevant in real life! As someone whose primary major is not Physics, she really inspires me to want to pursue Physics more seriously (never once in my life had I considered pursuing Physics PhD after grad, but I guess here we are).

Helpful?

0 0 Please log in to provide feedback.
Verified Reviewer This user is a verified UCLA student/alum.
Quarter: Spring 2025
Grade: A
June 18, 2025

I have heard only positive things about Dr. Naoz, so I came into the course very excited to have her as my professor. She is a very inspirational person. From her cheering us on for every exam and offering extra credit to citing studies on how education can better benefit students, it is clear she genuinely cares about teaching as well as her students.
However, I genuinely struggled to learn in this class. The exams were often worded in ways that were extremely confusing to me, and some questions had no indication that you needed to solve a problem a certain way or show work in a specific way. The exams themselves were easy conceptually and math-wise, but I just struggled with the wording. I also struggled to follow her lectures because of how disjointed they could be. She frequently made mistakes, would misspell words, and backtrack to the point where there were times I just stopped taking notes.
For better or worse, Dr. Naoz puts a lot of emphasis on astro-related concepts. Also, the content of the class is very skewed. You barely learn anything after week 7. If you come in with a strong foundation of Lagrangians, Hamiltonians, and special relativity, this class should be quite easy for you.
Overall, the class was relatively easy, but the lectures were a bit difficult to follow. It's doable to teach yourself from the textbook.

Helpful?

0 0 Please log in to provide feedback.
Verified Reviewer This user is a verified UCLA student/alum.
Quarter: Spring 2025
Grade: A-
June 7, 2025

Prof. Naoz is the GOAT. I didn't know what to expect for Physics 105B judging from my humdrum 105A experience with another professor, but she completely changed my perception of an ideal physics class and actually showed what this physics is used for.

Firstly, she is a very engaging lecturer who actively encourages participation, learning, work, and collaboration from us. Not in a forceful or demanding way, but actually a genuine teacher who strategically gets people involved with multitudes of extra credit opportunities, participation quizzes without punishing answers, and rewards people for paying attention and correcting her mistakes by throwing chocolates. She occasionally cracks funny jokes, lots of pop culture references (which are getting stale, much to her chagrin), most importantly, cares about her students' learning. Heck, she cites studies about the best ways of teaching students and accommodates for peoples' conflicting midterms by extending homework deadlines! Furthermore, she oozes with passion for physics, as she gives presentations showing the applications of the physic we are covering and often relates it to astrophysics, which is her main field of study (and also totally my thing). Her class is so lively with these things, it's so much more different that any other (upper) physics class I had. I imagine Naoz has spent an ungodly amount of time and effort into meticulously planning how she would teach this class. She has been teaching this class for multiple years and apparently this quarter is the last time she would do that, so god fricking damn please give her an award and let her keep teaching 105A and 105B!

Naoz's homework and example problems are quite challenging and I personally had to rely on office hours to figure these out. Naoz's office hours for homework help and concept clarifications are helpful; instead of straight up giving the answer, she really makes you learn by making you do the work yourself while nudging you along the way. I do wish she offered more office hours or extended them, because I found her more helpful than the TA. All of these did help prepare me for her exams, which turn out quite straightforward compared to her homework; she has even said that herself, just to eliminate any exam stress.

Helpful?

0 0 Please log in to provide feedback.
1 of 1
4.3
Overall Rating
Based on 3 Users
Easiness 4.0 / 5 How easy the class is, 1 being extremely difficult and 5 being easy peasy.
Clarity 4.0 / 5 How clear the class is, 1 being extremely unclear and 5 being very clear.
Workload 4.3 / 5 How much workload the class is, 1 being extremely heavy and 5 being extremely light.
Helpfulness 4.7 / 5 How helpful the class is, 1 being not helpful at all and 5 being extremely helpful.

TOP TAGS

  • Participation Matters
    (3)
  • Gives Extra Credit
    (3)
  • Engaging Lectures
    (2)
  • Would Take Again
    (2)
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