One of my favorite things to do on the first day of a math class is to get my students thinking about what math is and how they use it. I once had a student in a community college class who made it his mission to prove to me that it is possible to go an entire day without using math.…
If I asked you to define “mathematics,” what would you say? Is it solving problems? Is it memorizing number facts and rules? Is it fun or boring, easy or challenging? Is it a set of useful tools to help you through life or is it a bunch of irrelevant nonsense that you will never use? We each have our own ideas…