Articles

Pitfalls and Pluses in Using Numerical Software to Solve Differential Equations
by Robert Borrelli, Courtney Coleman

published February 8, 2009

Ordinary differential equations (ODEs) are often used to model the behavior of physical phenomena and textbooks today especially demonstrate this fact. Since only a very small collection of ODEs can be solved analytically, there is often no alternative than to use computer software to gain some insight into the behavior of solutions (and sometimes even if solution formulas are available--the formulas are often complicated!). A classic work on the numerical solution of ODEs was authored by ...

Classroom Voting: Active Learning in Differential Equations
by Kelly Cline, David Lomen

published January 11, 2010

Classroom voting is a technique that involves students more deeply in the lesson being presented--the more the students are involved, the more they will understand, and the more they will retain. The key idea behind classroom voting is a series of multiple-choice questions within a lesson plan which is provided by the instructor. After each question is posed, the students are given a few minutes to work through the problem, to form an opinion, and then discuss the question in small groups before...