The average math undergraduate student is never exposed to late 20th century mathematics. There is a consensus in the larger mathematical community that it is vital for students to see mathematics as an ongoing dynamic enterprise with significant impact on society. While undergraduates lack the technical sophistication to delve deeply, it is a disservice to them to avoid giving them a broad worldview of mathematics as a discipline. This talk will outline the development of a capstone course for preservice teachers and math majors which attempts to fill this gap in the curriculum.

Online homework submission systems have many advantages, for example: instant feedback to students, less (or no) work devoted to marking. But do they help students to learn?

At SFU, we have looked at a number of systems. We have come to the conclusion that neither the systems offered by textbook publishers nor those produced by Maplesoft give the students a meaningful enough experience, and there are significant costs attached to each. As an alternative we have begun using LON-CAPA, a freeware system which allows for full control of the content. One of its best features is the discussion board and how easy it is for the students to engage in discussions while working on the problems. We monitor the discussions, posting hints or corrections if needed, and make sure that the students do not just use them to share their solutions.

We introduced LON-CAPA homework first for MATH 157 (Business Calculus), then in our main calculus stream (MATH 151 and 152), and in MATH 190 (Math for Elementary Teachers), MATH 100 (Precalculus), and FAN X99 (Foundations of Academic Numeracy). We also used LON-CAPA to create a calculus-readiness test.

Mathematics plays an important role in interdisciplinary research, and there is a growing need for scientists who can work effectively on quantitative interdisciplinary projects. Starting in 1991, the University of British Columbia Vancouver (UBCV) Faculty of Science has developed an interdisciplinary first-year program called Science One to train new scientists who will be able to tackle problems that require tools from more than one discipline. Mathematics has been a core part of this program. I will present some ideas on the pedagogic benefits and pitfalls of integrating mathematics and science teaching at the university level. As we assess this program, we consider the question: How might we measure the impact Science One has on its students? I will present a brief overview of the qualitative and quantitative evidence that Science One has had a positive impact on students, faculty, and the university more broadly.

This presentation will share my story of learning analysis and efforts toward creating original mathematics in the graph theory. The two stories will be shared to illuminate the similarities and differences between the two experiences. Struggle, textbook usage, identity, community and other themes involved in the learning and teaching of mathematics will be discussed.

Large universities are often faced with stereotypes of how introductory courses are taught. Indeed, those courses are often taught in large lecture sections and/or taught by graduate students or adjunct lecturers. In this talk we will explore a uniform system for introductory courses (Precal and Cal I/II) at the University of Michigan that has shown recent success on the Calculus Concept Inventory-and a discussion of the elements that may lead to that success.

In a large first-year engineering calculus course we have been running a project focused on student independence, peer teaching, and a more conceptual approach to the material. Over the first few weeks we encountered a number of surprises in how the students reacted to this approach. We will summarize these results and indicate how our priorities have changed.