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Current use of technology in the Mathematics Department

Currently the Math Department has licenses for both MatLab and Maple. Several other departments also have site licenses for MatLab. Most notably the College of Engineering has licenses for over 100 concurrent users. These programs have been used sparingly for teaching purposes in the Math Department. Professor Snyder has used Matlab in a few courses, Professors Chapin and Young have used Maple in a few of sections and Ohio University Distinguished Professor S.K. Jain regularly teaches using MatLab (he is the author of a Linear Algebra text [4] which uses Matlab). Reasons that the software has not been more widely used are complex, but most stem from perceptions on the part of the faculty about how the software could be used. It was a commonly held notion that to use the software one must hold class in a ``technology classroom" and completely restructure the class around the technology. Opposition to doing this ranged from practical to philosophical. Ohio University has not been unique with respect to the last few statements. Introduction of Young's methods largely change this problem. In the faculty retreat in October 1999, the mathematics faculty unanimously approved the principals of Young's approach.

Aside from the issue of CS, many faculty in the Mathematics Department use graphing calculators in lower level courses. While this is good, it is largely independent of the things we are proposing. Graphing calculators are a good classroom teaching tool, but are far less powerful than MatLab, or similar packages, in term of the types of calculations they can perform. Also, for homework, and in the workplace, the visual advantage of a large screen and the speed of a personal computer are preferred over calculators. On the other hand, using MatLab directly in the classroom, is awkward and impractical on a large-scale basis. In light of these considerations, use of MatLab for homework should become standard, while use of graphing calculators in class should still be encouraged.


next up previous
Next: Why training students to Up: Computational Software in Undergraduate Previous: Introduction
Todd Young 2008-06-23