October 15, 1998--Wolfram Research, Inc. is proud to announce the grant recipients in
the 1998-99 Mathematica High School Grant Program.
Dale Beames
Coral Springs High School, Coral Springs, Florida
Dale received his M.S. in Physics from the University of Delaware.
He began his teaching career as a Peace Corps volunteer in Cameroon, where
he taught physics, mathematics, and English for two years. He taught
physics and mathematics at Wilmington Friends School in Wilmington, Delaware,
for four years and has been a physics teacher at Coral Springs High School
for 10 years.
Dale is using Mathematica with his Advanced Placement (AP) Physics
class to work on a project
in which students will model problems from their physics text and
previous AP Physics exams. Students will create Mathematica
notebooks in which they model problems in two-dimensional kinematics and
projectile motion, statics and dynamics, simple harmonic motion and wave
mechanics, and a topic of their choice. The final product of this
project will be a booklet containing student-generated solutions to a variety
of problems.
Susan Brown and
Virginia Highstone
York Community High School,
Elmhurst, Illinois
Susan received her M.S. in Technology from the University of Illinois at
Chicago. She is the chair of the Mathematics Department at York Community High School
and a member of the Board of Directors of the Illinois Council of Teachers of
Mathematics. She is coauthor of UCSMP Algebra and UCSMP Precalculus
and Discrete Mathematics. Susan is interested in integrating technology
into classrooms in many subjects and at different grade levels throughout
the school district. She also enjoys bringing connections between
mathematics and the physical world into the classroom and has spoken about
ways to do this at professional conferences.
Virginia received her M.S. in Education and Social Policy from Northwestern
University. She is a 1997 State Awardee of the Presidential Award
for Excellence in Mathematics and Science Teaching and a coauthor of UCSMP
Geometry and UCSMP Functions, Statistics, and Trigonometry. Her interests
include integrating writing into the mathematics curriculum and developing
projects that allow students to display their creativity. Virginia
uses technology to encourage students to explore and refine their thinking
about mathematics and has spoken on this topic at professional conferences.
She has a special interest in challenging the gifted mathematics student.
Susan and Virginia are using Mathematica with students in their Advanced
Algebra/Trigonometry, Junior and Enriched-Junior Precalculus, and College
Algebra classes. In each course, students will use Mathematica to
look at each topic numerically, algebraically, and graphically. In
addition, students will use the word-processing features of Mathematica
to write technical papers that explain their problem-solving processes and
results.
Christopher Butler
Boston University
Academy, Boston, Massachusetts
Christopher received his M.A. in Mathematics from Washington University
in St. Louis, Missouri. He taught high school mathematics at Princeton
Day School in New Jersey for four years. He was on the Information
Technology Committee at Princeton Day School and was actively involved
in planning the short- and long-term technology goals for the school.
In 1996 Christopher received the David C. Bogle Award to Support Excellence
in Teaching. Christopher is now in his second year of teaching mathematics
at Boston University Academy, where he is responsible for maintaining the
school's computer labs and the school network and serves as the faculty
advisor for the Math Club.
Christopher is using Mathematica with his calculus students to investigate
basins of attraction for Newton's Method on the real line and the complex
plane, Euler's Method and slope fields for differential equations, relations
between the graphs of the first and second derivatives and the primitive
function, techniques of integration and numerical methods for approximating
integrals, Taylor and Maclaurin series, and Fourier series. Christopher
is also using Mathematica with his precalculus students to examine trigonometric
functions, conic sections and their transformations, matrices and matrix
operations, and sequences and series.
Loring (Terry) Coes III
Rocky Hill School,
East Greenwich, Rhode Island
Terry received his Master's in Mathematics from Worcester Polytechnic Institute.
He has 27 years of experience teaching in grades four through 12. Terry
is currently on the NCTM Board of Directors and the editorial panel of
the periodical Mathematics Teacher and is the Mathematics Department
Chair at Rocky Hill School. He has authored multiple articles in
mathematical journals and is coauthor of the McDougall Littell/Houghton
Mifflin texts Algebra 1: Explorations and Applications and
Algebra 2: Explorations and Applications.
Terry is using Mathematica with his Mathematical Modeling and Calculus
classes. The Mathematical Modeling course is based upon applications of
precalculus concepts. Topics of investigation include iteration and
recursion, various kinds of growth and decay from population size to the
decay of medicine in the bloodstream, and fractals and chaotic behavior.
The calculus students will investigate the meaning of the derivative and
the antiderivative and examine the two functions in the context of
various applications. Students will also investigate the visual relationship
between functions and their derivatives and explore the concepts of continuity
and limits with Mathematica.
Julie Poage
Inchelium
High School, Inchelium, Washington
Julie received her Ph.D. in Curriculum and Instruction from the University
of Oregon. Julie has been teaching high school math and computers
at Inchelium High School for three years. Prior to her arrival in
Inchelium, she was a faculty member at Gonzaga University in Spokane, Washington,
and Ball State University in Muncie, Indiana, where she taught educational
technology courses to graduate and undergraduate education students.
Before entering higher education, Julie taught middle- and high-school science
for seven years. Julie is delighted to again be involved in classroom activities
in which she can combine her knowledge of computer technology and good
educational practices to engage students in the study of mathematics.
Julie is integrating Mathematica as a mathematical modeling tool into
her mathematics curriculum in all high school math classes in order
to increase students' understanding of real-world applications of a wide variety
of mathematical concepts. Julie and her students will use Mathematica
to explore applications of linear and quadratic functions, compare real-life
examples of arithmetic and geometric growth patterns, and explore applications
of basic trigonometric functions.
Travis Rose
Wilcox State Technical School,
Meriden, Connecticut
Travis received his B.S. in Mathematics from Charter Oak State College.
He is currently active in several committees, both at his school and for
the state of Connecticut. Travis is a faculty advisor for the school's
engineering club and is a member of both the State of Connecticut Mathematics Steering
Committee and the State of Connecticut Pre-Engineering Initiatives Program.
Travis is using Mathematica with his Integrated Engineering Math class.
Students will construct and solve systems of linear equations describing
electrical circuits, cover the basics of linear programming, and work on
regression analysis of linear and quadratic functions. Students will
be working in a laboratory setting to gather the data they will then
analyze with Mathematica.
Catherine Russell
Southgate Anderson High School, Southgate, Michigan
Catherine received her M.Ed. in Science Education from Wayne State University.
Catherine was the Southgate 1993 High School Teacher of the Year and the 1998
Sam's Club Teacher of the Year. At Southgate Anderson
High School she is the coadvisor for the Ecology Club and the coordinator
for landscaping activities. In addition to being awarded a 1998-99 Wolfram Research
High School Grant, Catherine was awarded a Growth Initiatives for Teachers
grant from GTE this year for innovative use of technology in mathematics
and science.
Catherine is incorporating Mathematica into her "Symmetry in Science"
class, which integrates mathematics, science, and technology. Her
students will study various patterns, cycles, and forms in nature
that can be described by the mathematics they are learning in Advanced
Algebra and Precalculus. Catherine's students will be using Mathematica
to do calculations, construct graphs, and formulate predictions about the
natural world.
Don Triezenberg
Holland Christian High School, Holland, Michigan
Don received his Ph.D. in Physics from the University of Maryland.
He teaches science and mathematics at Holland Christian High School and
is the chair of the Mathematics Department. Don has 20 years of
experience as a university administrator, eight years of experience as
a science and math teacher, and three years of experience offering pre-service
and in-service teacher training in science and mathematics.
Don is using Mathematica in his upper-level physics courses to generate
numerical solutions to second-order differential equations, thus enabling
students to explore the relation between real-world forces and the motion
these forces produce, to explore the phase diagrams for the motion of a simple
pendulum subject to various combinations of damping and driving forces,
and to write programs to create statistics for physical processes such
as diffusion. Students will use Mathematica to generate predictions
that they will compare to actual results generated in experiments.
In Don's freshman mathematics course, students will utilize the symbolic
manipulation ability of Mathematica to discover the distributive and commutative
properties of multiplication and the rules for multiplying and
factoring polynomials and the programming capability of Mathematica to create
realistic simulations based on sports contests and queuing theory. They
will also use Mathematica to explore the properties of exponential functions
and apply them to complex real-world situations.
Albert Watson and
Michael Oberle
The Fieldston School, Bronx, New York
Albert received his Ph.D. in Mathematical Education from Columbia University.
He has been teaching mathematics at the high-school and college levels
since 1966 and has been teaching at The Fieldston
School since 1980. Albert is coauthor of the Problemoids series of books on
mathematical problem solving for gifted elementary school students.
Michael received his M.S. in Mathematics from Yale University.
He is starting his fourth year of teaching calculus and statistics and
is currently a member of the curriculum committee. Michael is also
the scheduler for The Fieldston School, where he found Mathematica to be very
useful for scheduling classes over the summer. Michael's door is
always open for questions, ranging from "How do I differentiate sin(2x)?" to
"What rooms are free on Wednesday morning?"
Albert and Michael are using Mathematica with their Precalculus and
AB Calculus classes and have prepared both worksheet
and laboratory investigations for their students on a range of topics.
Students will investigate matrix operations and the use of matrices to
model mathematical problems and solve systems of equations; limits and
continuity; graphical interpretation of the derivative; Euler's method;
properties of logarithmic, exponential, and trigonometric functions; the
use of sound in conjunction with transformations of trigonometric functions;
and drug testing in the context of probability.
Kathleen Willson
Oakcrest High School, Mays Landing, New Jersey
Kathleen received her M.A. in Mathematics Education from Rowan University.
She is currently working toward her Master's of Instructional Technology
at The Richard Stockton College of New Jersey, funded by scholarship money from a Target
Grant that she was awarded. Kathleen has been teaching mathematics
at Oakcrest High School for 10 years and is a member of the Greater Egg
Harbor Regional High School District Technology Committee.
Kathleen is using Mathematica with her Algebra II and Precalculus classes.
Algebra II students will identify and graph constant functions; identity
functions, step functions, and absolute value functions; solve systems
of equations; and work with polynomials and complex numbers. Precalculus
students will graph polynomial functions and identify critical points;
examine tangents to a curve and first derivatives; graph and transform
trigonometric functions; and use Mathematica as a tool to discover various
theorems and patterns.
