Hacking Math Class: The Book

It seems like a century ago I learned from Seymour Papert that everything worth doing in math can be done using a computer. I learned enough Logo to make turtles walk around a screen and make geometrical figures, and I knew I was onto something every math student could use. After that every math class I taught had a computer component, much to the confusion of administrators and even my fellow math department members.

Years later I learned Python so I could help a computer-philic homeschooled kid explore math topics by writing programs. He excelled and his family was very supportive of my methods. I kept all the explorations we did and was inspired to do more exploring on my own.

The outcome of all this activity is Hacking Math Class With Python: Exploring Math Through Computer Programming, a 130-page book available for download on my website. It starts with an introduction to the Python programming language and its excellent turtle module. Those hardworking turtles are made to do everything from simple geometry to graphing polynomials to drawing fractals to transforming figures using matrices. Unique in its approach to math education, the book contains all the code necessary to explore math topics from arithmetic to differential equations.

Derivatives? Integrals? There are explorations in the book to help visualize Calculus problems and to show how easy it is to find numerical solutions. Vectors? They're the key to interactive graphics and animation, so why not have students write programs to make objects fly around the screen?

Every math textbook has a picture of a Mandelbrot Set, but until now none would actually teach the reader to draw one. That's because it would take you a year to iterate all those complex numbers without a computer. Hacking Math Class leads you step-by-step through the program.

Python is an excellent first language to learn, and there are plenty of people making a fine living programming in Python. The book presents the basic tools of programming and shows how powerful those tools can be. The reader is expected to install Python and code along. It's not "easy," but it rewards a bit of effort! Enjoy.