A Laboratory, Computer and Calculus Based Course in Mathematics

Abstract

Summary The paper describes the designing and testing of a laboratory, computer and calculus based course in mathematics. The laboratory is central to the course and stimulates in the student the need and desire to know more about mathematics. Further, it enables mathematics to be taught in a real world context. Computers are used to take the drudgery out of the mathematics and make it possible to attack real scientific and technical problems. This new approach to calculus is less formal and depends to a smaller extent upon prior mathematical training so that it appeals to a much wider audience. The proposed course, with its emphasis on laboratory measurements, is ideally suited to the exploration of numerical methods and their application to the calculation of derivatives, definite integrals and the solution of differential equations.