M50: An Introduction to Mathematica in the Classroom

Course Objective This hands-on one-day course provides high school and community college instructors an introduction to using Mathematica to teach, create demonstrations, and prepare course materials and student activities.

Presenter The course is presented by a Wolfram Education Group certified instructor.

Target Audience The course is designed for teachers at the high school or community college level who are new to Mathematica or who consider themselves to be relatively inexperienced at using Mathematica. The course includes coverage of topics in mathematics and in the physical and social sciences.

Delivery Type Courses are delivered as instructor-led classes in computer classroom facilities or as online classes over the web. Course topics are presented with alternating sessions of lectures and exercises. All classes feature low student-teacher ratios. This course is also available in Swedish.

Syllabus

Introduction
Introduction to Mathematica, including how to get Mathematica up and running, basic computations and plots, making definitions, animations, creating dynamic interfaces, and working with data; easy interaction with Mathematica is stressed through the use of palettes and templates
Presentations for the Classroom
Mathematica notebooks, creating and working with slideshows, creating and editing mathematical formulas, creating and working with interactive elements such as hyperlinks and buttons, tips and tricks for making and giving presentations
Tools for the Classroom
Tools and packages (provided with this course) that assist in plotting functions and data, creating tables of function values, plotting on grids, and creating randomized quizzes and exercise sheets; ways to incorporate Wolfram|Alpha into the classroom
Mathematica in the Classroom
Exploration of lessons from high school and community college mathematics and science, including geometric problems, solving linear systems, analytic geometry, optimization problems, linear approximations, and techniques of integration; course tools included for exploring many of these topics
Mathematica Tips and Tricks
Useful day-to-day tips on using Mathematica
Resources
Additional resources for self-study, including books, screencasts, seminars, etc.

Course Materials Each attendee will be provided with Mathematica course notebooks and packages as well as access to the current version of Mathematica. The course notebooks require Mathematica or Wolfram CDF Player, and the course packages require Mathematica. For attendees participating in classroom-based sessions, course materials are distributed in print and on CD-ROM, and are yours to keep; a computer running Mathematica is available for your use during class. For attendees participating in online classes, a download of the course materials is provided; a temporary Mathematica training license is provided upon request.

Prerequisites Course attendees are expected to have experience with common features of modern computer software. Also helpful, but not required, are knowledge of mathematics through elementary calculus and experience with computer programming at the level of an introductory course in any computer programming language. No prior Mathematica experience is required.