How to proceed

in high school Math

          by Mathematica

　

ABSTRACT

Morimoto Hideyuki

Department of Mathematics,

Matsumoto Agatagaoka High School,

Agata ,Matsumoto , 390 , Japan
　 There are a lot of reports and materials of Matematica for undergraduates. But there are quite a few of them for high school students. So I collect some examples of Math. for high school students by using Mathematica . I pick up a problem about the envelope of lines family.

First I sketch some graphs of one function f(x,y,t)=0 which has a parameter t. Usually there are lines with respect to x,y coordinates, because of avoiding unnecessary difficulties. And I show the animation of these graphs changing the value of parameter. Secondly I sketch some graphs of f(x,y,t)=0 with its envelope. Then I show the animation and overall graphs. Thirdly I solve the problem by traditional hand works. As powerful as the computer is, it is not nearly as powerful as our own intelligence and we will gain experience in using each to expand the power of the other.

 
  I pick up two more problems such as finding the intersections
 of two cylinders, or finding the minimum value of one implicit function. 　

I pick up two examples from my ordinary lecture for pre undergraduates classes. One is the Wierstrass’s example that is a continuous function but not differentiable on almost everywhere and founded in 1875. Students are usually given some examples of continuous function but not differentiable on some isolated points. The other is Taylor's Polynomials of nth orders. Students think that trigonometric functions are quite different from polynomial functions. These are in the category of difficult discussions. But I think it is useful for any science class to give such graphical images without strictly discussions. My aim is to give not only some inspirations of how to solve the problems but also some feelings of reality of the problems and some wills of creations.

　 For Japanese high school students it may be difficult to make some programs or even type out some Mathematica’s commands. If we make good pallets , these are expected to be the extremely effective tools for Mathematical education. Pallets of Mathematica ver. 3.0 are convenient for some settled purposes such as teaching some materials of high school Mathematics. I use some pallets and buttons in this report. 

This report is only ordinary use for high school students to build up their fundamental firm and to make proceed their power of Mathematics. Programs of this report completely depend on Mathematica by means of using some beautiful graphics , animation and pallets and buttons. These graphics and the animation are not so incredible nor excellent, but useful for beginners of science course students. I have had 7 hours lectures of these examples of this report for these three years. Those were very good times for me and students.

　 　Problem from the minimum value of one implicit function.   　 Back to home