Mathematics Illuminated

Do you know how many riffle shuffles it takes to get an ordered deck of cards into a random order, or that it has something to do with symmetry? (I know - what is a riffle shuffle?)

Do you know how/why Neptune was discovered? Do you know to what the phrase "sensitive dependence on initial conditions" refers or what Jules Henri Poincare discovered in the late 19th century that influences our weather forecasting today?

I enjoy looking at different selections of free online courses from Open Culture, The Best Free Cultural and Educational Media on the Web.

Today I was browsing through some of their math options (under the Sciences heading, look for Mathematics). One that looked interesting was Mathematics Illuminated, a 13-part series looking at the big picture and how mathematics has influenced our knowledge. Before I left the web site, I had watched the videos on Symmetry and Chaos - where you can find the answers to those questions I posed at the start of this post.

The site suggests this course is for adult learners and high school teachers, and graduate credit is available. However, I can't help but think it might be great for those high school students who are motivated by relevant content in their classes. The videos are informative and interesting, with accompanying online textbook, interactive activities, participant and presenter documents. It's all very well done and very accessible.

This course is part of the Annenberg Learner, whose "mission is to advance excellent teaching in American schools through the development and distribution of multimedia resources for teaching and learning." Their course videos exemplify excellent teaching. They focus on the teacher and students both as a learners, such an important concept in our today's educational environment.

http://www.openculture.com/freeonlinecourses
http://www.learner.org/courses/mathilluminated/
http://www.learner.org