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  University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign's BioCalc: A Model for Teaching Calculus to Biology Students Go to next page

Picture of Jerry Uhl
Dr. Jerry Uhl
Professor of Mathematics


"Using the Mathematica notebooks, we could design a course in which students make their own observations and learn in much the same way researchers do: through discovery, visualization, and experimentation."



Introduction
    In this section, we introduce you to the BioCalc course: what it is, what happens in class on a typical day, how well it's working, as well as the people who made it happen and keep it going.

The Setting

    Here we present the background information necessary to understand the development of a course like BioCalc: changes in biology education, the calculus reform movement, and how these played out at UIUC.

Learning Problems and Goals

    Here we examine the learning problems that motivated the development of BioCalc, as well as the goals the faculty set for student learning.

Creating the Learning Environment

    In this section, we look closely at how the UIUC faculty created the BioCalc learning environment: the philosophies and principles that guide their choices, the tools and activities they use, and the technology that makes the changes possible.

Outcomes

    Is BioCalc working? Are students learning better? In this section, we summarize the results of several independent assessments.

Implementation

    What does it take to get a course like this off the ground? The UIUC faculty share the types of resources needed, how they got started, as well as advice on addressing the problems they encountered along the way.

Conclusion

    "This is action calculus."


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