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DeltaTick: Applying Calculus to the Real World through Behavioral Modeling

Certainly one of the most powerful and important modeling languages of our time is the Calculus. But research consistently shows that students do not understand how the variables in calculus-based mathematical models relate to aspects of the systems that those models are supposed to represent. Because of this, students never access the true power of calculus: its suitability to model a wide variety of real-world systems across domains. In this paper, we describe the motivation and theoretical foundations for the DeltaTick and HotLink Replay applications, an effort to address these difficulties by a) enabling students to model a wide variety of systems in the world that change over time by defining the behaviors of that system, and b) making explicit how a system\'s behavior relates to the mathematical trends that behavior creates. These applications employ the visualization and codification of behavior rules within the NetLogo agent-based modeling environment (Wilensky, 1999), rather than mathematical symbols, as their primary building blocks. As such, they provide an alternative to traditional mathematical techniques for exploring and solving advanced modeling problems, as well as exploring the major underlying concepts of calculus.

Identiferoai:union.ndltd.org:DRESDEN/oai:qucosa.de:bsz:14-qucosa-81136
Date22 May 2012
CreatorsWilkerson-Jerde, Michelle H., Wilensky, Uri
ContributorsHTW Dresden, Informatik, Mathematik
PublisherSaechsische Landesbibliothek- Staats- und Universitaetsbibliothek Dresden
Source SetsHochschulschriftenserver (HSSS) der SLUB Dresden
LanguageEnglish
Detected LanguageEnglish
Typedoc-type:conferenceObject
Formatapplication/pdf
SourceProceedings of the tenth International Conference Models in Developing Mathematics Education. - Dresden : Hochschule für Technik und Wirtschaft, 2009. - S. 587 - 591

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