most recent 30 from http://mathoverflow.net 2013-05-26T01:32:41Z http://mathoverflow.net/feeds/user/21546 http://www.creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/2.5/rdf http://mathoverflow.net/questions/88946/readings-for-an-honors-liberal-art-math-course brian loft 2012-02-19T17:55:22Z 2012-03-03T22:02:11Z

<p>Our university has an Honors section of our "liberal arts mathematics" course. Typically 10-20 students enroll each Fall, with most of them extremely bright, but lacking the interest and/or mathematics background of many of the students we usually see in calculus.</p> <p>I've taught this section twice already: once using the really good book on voting and apportionment methods by Jonathan Hodge and Richard Klima, and another topology course centered around Jeff Weeks' <em>The Shape of Space</em>. </p> <p>Next Fall, however, I'd like to run more of a reading seminar course, in which students read and discuss several shorter books and papers aimed at a general audience. I'm having trouble however coming up with a good list of titles. So far I'm thinking of <em>Flatland</em> and <em>Innumeracy</em>. Not bad choices, but I was hoping for some more "mathematical" readings. </p> <p>Any suggestions of books and/or papers? Maybe some specific expository articles in the MAA's Monthly?</p> <p>Thanks.</p>

http://mathoverflow.net/questions/88946/readings-for-an-honors-liberal-art-math-course/90109#90109 brian loft 2012-03-03T16:05:41Z 2012-03-03T16:05:41Z

Later in the course, I'm hoping each student will be interested in a particular theorem/mathematician/branch of mathematics, and I can guide her (in the past, 27 of my 30 students were female) to a paper or book that will be the main source for a paper to be presented to the rest of the class.

http://mathoverflow.net/questions/88946/readings-for-an-honors-liberal-art-math-course/90109#90109 brian loft 2012-03-03T16:04:29Z 2012-03-03T16:04:29Z

My goals are to expose these students to a bit of higher mathematics without getting lost in too much background material. Some good ideas I've seen have been books of essays (e.g. <i>Mathematics in the Bedroom</i>) that will spark conversation, books devoted to biographies of mathematicians that will encourage a context of history, and books on the philosophy of mathematics (e.g. Letter to a Young Mathematician) that will prompt a more broad discussion about the field itself.